(IDEX Online) - Thirty-one workers were sacked for stealing diamonds from Anjin Investments in Zimbabwe's Marange fields last year.Rough gems were taken during ore processing at Chiadzwa in what is described by The Manica Post newspaper as a "well-orchestrated" operation.The perpetrators, among them some security officers, passed the stolen diamonds on to diamond dealers."A total of 31 employ...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Jewelers are being warned about distraction thefts after two separate incidents in which thieves switched fakes for genuine goods.In one case, on 1 February, a "customer" reached into a display case and pointed at a pair of diamond earrings.It was only later that staff at the store, in Canton, Ohio, USA, discovered the switch from surveillance video.In another, in the Indianapolis&...Read More
(IDEX Online) - At least nine workers died in a collapse at one of Burkina Faso's many unregulated artisanal gold mines.Rescuers found four bodies last Tuesday night (7 February) at the mine in the western Tuy province, and another five the following morning.Burkina Faso, in west Africa, is the world's 12th biggest gold producer (102.8 tonnes in 2021). There are an estimated 800 ar...Read More
(IDEX Online) - The Angolan government plans to sell shares in Endiama, the national diamond miner, as part of a series of economic reforms.It will initially make five or 10 per cent of its shares available with a listing initially on the Angolan stock exchange and subsequently with a secondary foreign listing, according to a Reuters news report. But that figure could increase to 30 per cent.Endia...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Debswana saw rough sales increase by almost a quarter in 2022, as buyers shunned Russian goods.Total revenue last year hit a record $4.588bn, up 24.2 per cent from $3.466bn in 2021.That's equivalent to a 48.3 per cent rise in local currency (pula) because of the stronger US dollar, according to a Reuters news report.Debswana, a joint venture between De Beers and the Botswana g...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Diamond tech firm Sarine has launched a website for consumers designed to build trust and confidence in natural diamonds.It takes them on the journey from a diamond's rough origins to its final, polished form and addresses tracaeability and sustainability issues in the industry. In 2019 Sarine introduced Diamond Journey, a provenance-tracking program for the industry with...Read More
(IDEX Online) - A parcel of 129,400-carats of rough diamonds that has been at the center of a 12-year dispute in Zimbabwe is to be returned to UK miner Vast Resources.They'd been in custody of the Zimbabwean Reserve Bank since 2010. Vast is preparing to sell the diamonds through a tender once it receives a signed order from the High Court of Zimbabwe.It began formal proceedings to recove...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Fancy color diamonds increased in value by an average of 3.9 per cent in 2022, more than double the 1.7 per cent rise in 2021.Yellows drove most of that increase, according to the Fancy Color Diamond Index published today by the Fancy Color Research Foundation (FCRF).They were up by an average of 5.6 per cent across all sizes, colors and intensities, with the sharpest increase of a...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Watch and jewelry sales in the US fell for a third consecutive month in December, as consumers kept a careful eye on their Christmas purchases. They fell by 1.9 per cent according to the latest figures from the Department of Commerce, although that figure will almost certainly be revised. As it stands, it indicates some degree of recovery after sales fell by 4.2 per cent in October...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Troubled Petra Diamonds says it's open to merger and acquisition (M&A) proposals.The UK-based miner agreed a debt-for-equity restructuring deal with lenders in October 2020, after failing to attract buyers for a proposed sale."We have got opportunities to grow organically, but given that we are through this restructuring and we have a much more robust balance sheet, we wou...Read More
(IDEX Online) - January proved to be yet another month of straight-line decline for the IDEX Polished Price Index amid ongoing caution and uncertainty. It fell 1.17 per cent, compared with 0.76 per cent in December and 2.62 per cent in November 2022. Festive spending may have cushioned some of the Index's fall in December. January's decline is less than half that of November, which could...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Gem Diamonds reports a six per cent dip in its full-year revenue for 2022, down to $188.6m.The UK-based miner, which owns 70 per cent of the Letseng diamond mine, in Lesotho, says average per carat prices also dropped slightly, down four per cent to $1,755.Letseng, renowned for its large, top color, exceptional white diamonds, is the highest average dollar per carat kimberlite diam...Read More
(IDEX Online) - A 126-carat "cat's eye" emerald was among the largest ever submitted for grading, said the GIA lab in Tokyo.The cabochon gemstone - shaped with a convex obverse rather than faceted - shows a pronounced chatoyant - or cat's eye - effect. That's when a band of bright light is reflected by a series of rain-like inclusions aligned within the stone."The emerald contained...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Diamonds worth $55m have been seized in a series of raids across Antwerp, reportedly in an attempt to recover debts owed by the collapsed Eurostar Diamond Traders.Bailiffs and police seized gems from more than a dozen homes and offices in a court-sanctioned revery of assets, according to a Bloomberg new report.Eurostar was a De Beers sightholder and one of the world's biggest...Read More
(IDEX Online) -Tiffany has teamed up with Nike to launch a pair of classic sneakers with a swoosh in its trademarked blue.Pairs of the black suede AF1s - a design dating back to 1982 - will be sold at two Tiffany & Co New York City locations and globally via Nike's SNKRS app from 7 March, priced $400. Regular AF1s (Air Force 1) retail for around $100.Tiffany trademarked the robin's-e...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Diamond manufacturers in India are angry that calls to abolish a two per cent equalisation levy on natural diamonds were ignored in last week's budget.Lab grown businesses will benefit from the scrapping of a five per cent import tax on the seeds from which diamonds are grown, as announced by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman. But mined diamonds, which account for 90...Read More
(IDEX Online) - A New York City jeweler has been convicted of laundering money for an armed gang that stole high-value stole watches and jewelry worth $2m.They targeted jewelers near their homes in New York and New Jersey in a series of assaults from October 2019 to November 2020.Stanislav "Steve" Yakubov, 42, of Queens, New York, acted as a fence, selling on watches the gang had stolen, which inc...Read More
(IDEX Online) - De Beers today reported an increase of almost six per cent in its total rough production during Q4, to 8.2m carats.Total output for the full year of 2022 was 34.6m carats (slightly above its production guidance of 32m to 34m carats). That's an increase of seven per cent on 2021's 32.3m carats. The UK-based miner said 2023 production guidance was 30m to 33m carats at...Read More
(IDEX Online) - AIB Express Logistics, third-party shippers for diamonds and other valuables, has been bought by Sweden-based Loomis International, provider of global secure logistics, for an undisclosed sum.The agreement was signed last month and Loomis says AIB will carry on operating as normal, albeit with Loomis branding.AIB is primarily based in the US, had a total revenue of more than SEK 10...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Zimbabwe's central bank has notified diamond and other miners that half the royalties due to the government must be paid in raw minerals.The move is designed to maintain the value of the country's assets by building up a national reserve of precious metals and stones. It was announced last October by President Emmerson Mnangagwa (pictured).The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe sai...Read More