Exclusive
Diamond market crash is Africa’s opportunity, not its crisis – M'zée Fula Ngenge
Global natural diamond supply is forecast to fall below 95 million carats this year, the lowest since 1987. For Dr. M'zée Fula Ngenge, chairperson of the African Diamond Council (ADC), this is not a death knell but a clarion call. In an exclusive...
Yesterday
Tracr passes 5 million rough diamonds milestone as De Beers expands provenance push
De Beers Group's blockchain-enabled traceability platform Tracr reached a significant milestone in 2025, with more than 5 million rough diamonds individually scanned and registered, up from 2.8 million cumulative registrations reported in 2024. The...
28 september 2026
South African diamonds head to Hong Kong: SDT partners with BRINKS for JGW 2026
South Africa’s State Diamond Trader (SDT) has confirmed the country's participation in Jewellery & Gem World Hong Kong (JGW) 2026 through a partnership with BRINKS. SDT marketing and communication manager Tsholofelo Gopolang Tselapedi...
14 september 2026
David Benderly: PermaScribe seeks to put trust mark on diamond table, not just girdle
In this interview with Rough & Polished’s Mathew Nyaungwa, PhotoScribe Technologies president and chief executive David Benderly explains how PermaScribe differs technically from conventional laser inscription, its potential to strengthen security, and...
31 august 2026
The great reset: Paul Zimnisky on supply catharsis, De Beers' bargain and the case for natural diamonds
The natural diamond industry is in the throes of its most profound reset in a generation. Supply is plunging to its lowest level since 1987 and De Beers—once valued at over $9 billion—is reportedly being sold for as little as $1 billion.
Lab-grown...
10 august 2026
What will the impact be of De Beers rough auction sales announcement?
23 april 2018
A recent announcement to the diamond trade by Neil Ventura, Executive Vice-President, Auction Sales, at De Beers showed the direction that the mining giant heading in regarding auction sales. He said that the De Beers Auction Sales business has "acted as a catalyst for widespread industry change in selling practices" and now "the vast majority of producers of all sizes, including even producer country governments, have adopted auctions for at least a part of their overall sales mix. The firm has developed its auction program to enable customers to secure future supply at its auctions by launching a forward contract sales program to enable customers to do so. It then further developed the system from a floating price system to fixed prices. Last year, the miner started selling its own polished diamonds, as well as allowing third parties to sell their polished goods on the De Beers platform. The miner said that its aim was to provide customers with a ‘one-stop shop’ for its sourcing needs – saying this offers benefits in terms of efficiencies and reduced costs. Although diamond manufacturers – especially De Beers' sightholders – won't publicly comment, off the record they are not exactly delighted by the move.
The measurability of beauty
16 april 2018
This article opens a series of popular science publications about rough and polished diamonds, their properties and characteristics, peculiarities of their origin, mining, cutting and polishing and evaluation. And we start with the latter – a 4C system widely used for describing the jewellery characteristics and for the subsequent polished diamond pricing.
Responsible supply chains sine qua non for diamonds, other precious stones
09 april 2018
The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KP), which was established by the southern African diamond-producing countries in 2000, came into effect on 1 January 2003 in a bid to eliminate the use of rough diamonds to finance armed conflict. The scheme, currently under the leadership of the European Union (EU), also aimed at protecting the legitimate diamond industry, upon which many countries depended. KP, which was also endorsed by the United Nations’ General Assembly, made a massive contribution during its formative stage to the implementation of then fragile peace agreements in Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Liberia and Sierra Leone by blocking resources to potential spoilers. The scheme members are now said to be responsible for stemming 99.8 percent of the global production of conflict diamonds. However, some non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are not convinced that KP had made such an astounding progress.
Are SMEs in Indian diamond industry crushed between 'a rock and a hard place'?...
02 april 2018
Yes, undoubtedly... as the position right now is not conducive for small and medium manufacturing units to survive, given that bank financing and loans are hard to get and prices of rough don't allow making profits out of the manufacturing process.
New times, new challenges for shopping malls fighting to stay alive
26 march 2018
An ongoing death rattle is being heard in the US retail sector, as malls across the country are being forced to deal with what some are calling the “retail apocalypse”. Credit Suisse Bank has forecast that as many as a quarter of them will be closing their doors by around 2023. The malls have fallen victim to consumers' changing shopping habits and desires and, of course, online shopping.
Ten innovations which changed the diamond industry
19 march 2018
The Mining sector has always been a source of innovation, striving to better safety and efficiency and deal earnestly with environmental concerns. Among the many steps taken by mining companies across the globe, some of them have made radical changes to the sector.
Diamond producers can’t rest on their laurels in the face of synthetics threat
12 march 2018
In January 2017 I asked the then De Beers head of media relations Lynette Gould whether natural diamond producers were worried that they might lose some market share to lab-grown stones. She was dismissive in her response, claiming that natural diamonds and synthetics were two different propositions. “Our research consistently shows that consumers do not see synthetic diamonds as potential substitutes for natural diamonds,” said the De Beers spokesperson at the time. She, however, said that the challenge that they needed to focus on was ensuring the reputation of the industry – and the integrity of the product we sell – was beyond question. “Challenges to product integrity, such as the risk of undisclosed synthetics infiltrating the pipeline, are things that we take very seriously,” said Gould.
JUNWEX St. Petersburg opens the jewellery season of 2018
05 march 2018
Year in, year out, JUNWEX St. Petersburg opens a new jewellery season – and most of the Russian jewellers create their new collections or just new jewellery pieces for this show and not for the Christmas and New Year sales. For the jewelers, the participation in JUNWEX St. Petersburg is a must that gives them the opportunity to show their colleagues, partners and clients the best items created during the year, and for the jewellery wholesalers – to buy the goods they expect to be in demand.
Stalin’s Secret Diamonds
26 february 2018
The sanctions and anti-sanctions game, which we have lately the pleasure to watch almost every day, cannot but put the diamond market players on edge. There are grounds for concern: the diamond trade and politics have crossed each other’s path rather often over the last century and the effect of these contacts was mixed. So, it is helpful to use the historical cases demonstrating the triumph of common sense and desire for constructive development over tactical political interests.
Gem Diamonds’ stock price can rally if it continues digging large stones
19 february 2018
Gem Diamonds had a good start to the year as it recovered four “high quality” diamonds over 100 carats last January from its 70 percent-owned Letšeng mine, in Lesotho. The mine was well-known for the production of large, top colour, exceptional white diamonds, making it the highest dollar per carat kimberlite diamond mine in the world.
