De Beers tenders rough in Ramat Gan after nine years
Hon reports the two-day sale ran on 14 and 15 October at the exchange in Ramat Gan. Days earlier the bourse and Israel's Tax Authority signed a flat turnover-tax agreement covering 2027 and 2028, replacing a minimum-income floor.
By Carat Capital
What changed
De Beers tendered in Israel again. Rough went in front of buyers at the Ramat Gan exchange on 14 and 15 October, after nine years without such a sale. Days earlier the bourse signed a 2027-28 turnover-tax deal.
What it means
- If you trade on the Ramat Gan floor: A flat charge on turnover replaces the minimum-income floor for anyone who joins. The rate is not published, so the sum cannot yet be done.
- If you are weighing Antwerp against Dubai: Israel now offers a known tax bill plus duty-free entry for gems, against 5% customs in Dubai.
- What this is not: A result. No lots, carats, prices or signatures have been reported from the tender, and Israel's own tax rate has not been printed by anyone.
Key figures
| The tender's two daysIsrael Diamond Exchange, Ramat Gan | 14-15 Oct |
|---|---|
| Since the last such sale in IsraelNine yearsHon's count, not independently verified | |
| Years the new tax agreement coverssigned days before the tender | 2027-28 |
| Belgium's taxable income on turnoverdescribed as more than three times Israel's | 2.1% |
Source: All figures from Hon's report of 13 October 2026 Israel time, read from the raw page, 200, 755,369 bytes. The tender dates are derived from the report's own dateline and its phrase placing the goods on the table from the following day until Thursday. No result has been published by De Beers or by the exchange.
The tender has already run
Two days, now past. Hon dated its report 13 October Israel time and placed the goods on the table from the following day until Thursday. That is 14 and 15 October.
No result exists. Neither De Beers nor the exchange has published a lot count, a carat weight, an asking price or a sell-through. The report carries none of them either.
Nine years is theirs. The gap since the last such sale in Israel is Hon's own count. Carat Capital has not matched it against a De Beers sight calendar.
| Item | As Hon states it | Printed figure |
|---|---|---|
| De Beers tender, Ramat Gan | Goods on the table 14 to 15 October | Dates only |
| Gap since the last Israeli sale | Nine years | Nine years |
| Tax agreement | Signed with the Tax Authority, covering 2027 and 2028 | No rate given |
| Belgian comparator | 2.1% of turnover as taxable income | 2.1% |
| Israel's own rate | “More than three times” below Belgium's | Not printed |
| Customs on gems and jewellery | Free in Israel, 5% in Dubai | 0% / 5% |
| Tender result | Not reported | None |
Carat Capital has not divided 2.1% by three or by any other number to produce an Israeli rate. The source states a comparison and withholds the figure; a rate computed from “more than three times” would be a range this paper invented, not a number anyone published. The row reads Not printed for that reason.
The tax deal has a date
A floor is cancelled. A dealer who joins the arrangement pays a fixed percentage of turnover. The minimum-income floor, which forced a set reported income in thin years, goes for entrants.
The rate is withheld. Hon prints Belgium's 2.1% of turnover and calls it more than three times Israel's figure. It never prints the Israeli number itself.
Two years, not more. The agreement covers the 2027 and 2028 tax years. Nothing in the report says what happens after that or who is eligible to elect in.
The competition is the point
Duty is another lever. Gems and jewellery enter Israel free of customs duty against 5% in Dubai, and Hon describes foreign company registration as faster in Israel.
Volume wins, margin loses. A flat charge on turnover favours a house that turns stock fast at a thin margin and penalises one that trades a small book wide.
The test is unanswered. Whether buyers signed at the tender is what the two days were for. From outside, a sale that drew lookers reads the same as one that cleared.
What to watch
- Any day nowA De Beers or exchange statement giving the tender's result. Nothing has been issued since the sale closed on 15 October.
- Before 1 January 2027Publication of the Israeli flat rate. Until it exists, no dealer outside the arrangement can price the choice.
- OngoingWhether Antwerp or Dubai answers. Both have competed for the same dealer base through 2026.
The story so far
Go deeper
What would change this call
A second Israeli outlet, or the exchange's own statement. This rests on one Hebrew financial title. The tender dates are derived from the report's dateline rather than stated as calendar dates in the text, and if Hon published later than its JSON-LD timestamp says, the two days shift. A published Israeli rate would also change the reading entirely: a flat charge that lands near 0.7% of turnover is a different proposition from one near 0.2%, and nothing available tonight distinguishes them.
What a minimum-income floor does to a diamond book
Israel has long taxed diamond dealers against a floor rather than purely against their accounts. The mechanism obliges a dealer to report at least a set level of income, calculated by formula, whatever the books say. In a strong year the floor is irrelevant because real profit clears it. In a weak year it becomes the whole tax bill, and it arrives in exactly the year a dealer can least afford it. That asymmetry is why the floor has been a grievance in Ramat Gan through a two-year downturn in which polished exports fell by a fifth. Replacing it with a flat percentage of turnover does two things at once. It makes the bill predictable, because turnover is known monthly and a percentage of it can be budgeted. And it moves the burden from profit to volume, which rewards a trading house that moves goods quickly and thin, and punishes a house that holds inventory and sells a few stones at a wide spread. Belgium made the same move years ago and settled at 2.1% of turnover as deemed taxable income, which is the comparator Hon reaches for. The Israeli number is the thing that decides whether this is a concession or a restructuring, and it has not been published.
Method
One source, fetched directly in this run and saved as raw bytes before any figure was read: hon.co.il, 200, 755,369 bytes. The publication date is the page's own JSON-LD datePublished, 2026-10-12T21:05:57+00:00, which is 13 October 00:05 Israel time; it is not a listing artefact. Figures were read only from the article's own body block, taken between the entry-content opening and the related-posts widget, so that no figure belonging to a neighbouring story could be matched. ARCHIVE, by entity and by period, hits opened and read, not counted: grep -ril 'Ramat Gan' website/*.html returns 6 hits; the five article pages among them are a-dubai-diamond-week-returns, a-dvash-takes-the-odc-chair, a-israel-exchange-loses-its-chief, a-israel-rough-down-thirty-five and a-one-carat-wakes-up, each opened and read, covering a Dubai event, a chairmanship, a resignation, Israel's H1 2026 trade figures and a polished index. None covers a De Beers tender in Israel. grep -ril 'Tax Authority' website/a-*.html returns 0 and grep -ril 'minimum income' returns 0; grep -rl '2.1%' returns 12 article pages, each checked for the word Belgium, none carrying both. DELIBERATELY NOT PRINTED, because this paper has already run them and they are not new: the H1 2026 Israeli trade figures carried on the same Hon page ($625.7m net polished exports, down 22.3%) are this paper's own of 23 August, and De Beers' $105 a carat and $1.313bn H1 rough revenue are this paper's own of 31 July. ALSO WITHHELD, as unreconciled rather than new: Hon gives De Beers' H1 underlying EBITDA as a $113m loss against $189m, and unit cost at $64 a carat from $87; this paper printed an underlying loss of $188 million and $64 a carat on 31 July, and the two accounts do not obviously describe the same measure. That discrepancy is routed to the standards desk rather than printed here.