De Beers cut prices of +1ct rough stones ahead of August sight – report

De Beers has lowered prices of rough stones larger than 1 carat by 6% to 8% ahead of the August sight slated for this week, according to media reports.
Rapaport News reports that the cut was necessitated by a steady improvement in demand and shortages in certain categories.
“Very few people have seen their goods and received their prices, but there’s been some price alignment in areas where De Beers thought they could see what the polished benchmark was,” an unnamed source was quoted as saying.
“De Beers wants to understand the market first before they start carefully bringing goods back to the market, which is a sensible thing to do.”
Sight participants are expecting a sales value above $200 million at next week’s sight. 
De Beers is said to have stopped its policy of allowing sightholders to defer 100% of their rough purchase allocations to later in the year.
This had been in place since the March-April trading session. 
However, an unnamed company spokesperson cited by Rapaport said they will offer some deferrals although they have registered some improvement in market conditions.
Sightholders will also manage to use the buyback concession, which allows them to sell 20% or 30% of their purchases back to De Beers depending on the diamond type.

Mathew Nyaungwa, Editor in Chief of the African Bureau, Rough&Polished