Diamonds
The stone that runs on trust
Rough and polished, natural and mined, priced sight by sight. The diamond desk follows the pipeline end to end — producer sales in Gaborone, tenders in Antwerp and Dubai, manufacturing in Surat, memo programs in New York — and publishes the prices the trade actually deals at.
At a glance
| 1ct RBC · natural, trade, 26 Oct | $3,019 |
|---|
Latest
Lab-grown producers' council threatens action over 'synthetic'The Diamond Producers Council told jewelers on 20 October to reject CIBJO's September call for the word. It says its members grow more than 20 million carats a year.- IGI's lab-grown jewelry segment grows 47%, natural jewelry 3%Revenue at the Mumbai-listed grader rose 31% to INR 3,980 million in the July to September quarter. Profit after tax rose 43% to INR 1,858 million on 4.35 million reports.
- India's US gem and jewellery exports near $3 billion, GJEPC saysExports to the US rose nearly 6% in April to September from US$2.77 billion a year earlier, GJEPC's chairman said on 23 October. They had fallen more than 44% in April to December 2025.
- Surat diamond unit shuts before Diwali with ₹10 lakh of pay owedThe owner of Marutinandan Diamonds in Varachha is untraceable, police said on 23 October. The union says he paid ₹4.50 lakh of ₹14.50 lakh in wages, then stopped answering.
- Petra Diamonds holders face a share suspension from 2 NovemberThe London-listed miner says its FY2026 audit is unfinished, so it expects to miss the 31 October deadline for its annual report. It gives no date for trading to resume.
- De Beers pays 1bn pula into Botswana fund, JCK reportsThe transfer is the initial payment under the 2023 deal, which Botswana said would total P10 billion over 10 years. JCK puts it at about $73 million.
- GJEPC targets $50m in New Zealand as trade pact takes effectIndia's gem and jewellery exports to New Zealand were $25.43 million in FY2025-26, the export council says. New Zealand's foreign ministry says the agreement entered into force on 20 October.
- Burgundy sets out breach remedies as ASX directs a November updateIts 9 October notice accepts that three 2025 rough pre-sales to a director's company needed shareholder approval first. ASX lists Burgundy as long suspended, with three periodic reports overdue.
- De Beers' rough price index falls 20% as sales volume nearly doublesThird-quarter output fell 11% to 6.8 million carats as Orapa and Venetia slowed. Rough sales rose 4% to $731m, and 2026 guidance rises to 25–28 million carats with all of Gahcho Kué.
- Court winds up Petra's treasury unit over £5.65m tax claimThe order came at the 14 October hearing, nine days after Questco was named to run the strategic review. A restructuring accountant joined the board as senior independent director on 13 October.
- India's rough imports rise 65.65% in carats, 15.14% in valueSeptember's 130.17 lakh carats cost $1.05bn, GJEPC provisional data show. On Carat Capital's division, the average imported carat cost about 30% less than a year earlier.
- Namdeb asks Namibia for fresh capital as diamond revenue fallsFinance minister Ericah Shafudah says Namdeb Holdings proposed a recapitalisation in September. No amount is set, and its chief executive puts revenue 60% below the pre-slump forecast.
- Richemont and Signet are in talks to join the De Beers bidBloomberg and Reuters report both in talks to join the Global Diamond Consortium, the preferred bidder for Anglo American's De Beers stake. Neither investment would necessarily be large.
What’s moving now
Supply · Gaborone
Producers hold the line on rough
De Beers-style supply discipline is back: allocations trimmed, prices defended. Polished has stabilized after two brutal years — the question is whether midstream margins recover before credit patience runs out.
Positioning · Global
The gap becomes the strategy
Natural sellers have stopped competing with lab-grown on price and started competing on provenance, rarity and resale. Watch the marketing budgets, not the price lists. The dated gap itself is on the price pages, not here.
Regulation · Antwerp
Traceability goes from virtue to invoice
Origin platforms are no longer CSR decoration — G7 rules and retailer mandates are making sourcing paperwork a condition of sale. Compliant goods are starting to command a measurable premium.
The working vocabulary
The trade’s terms, plainly told. More in the Field Guide.
- The Sight Term
- De Beers' ten-times-a-year allocation sale, where approved buyers — sightholders — purchase rough in pre-assembled boxes at prices set by the producer. Refusing a box has consequences; so does needing one.
- Four Cs vs. the fifth Concept
- Carat, color, clarity, cut set the grade — but the trade increasingly prices a fifth C: certainty of origin. Two identical stones can part ways on price over a paper trail.
- Midstream squeeze Dynamic
- Miners set rough prices, retailers set polished prices, and the cutters and traders in between absorb the difference. When both ends tighten at once, Surat and Antwerp bleed first — the industry's recurring crisis.
- Memo Practice
- Goods consigned to retailers on memorandum — sold before they're paid for. Memo keeps counters full and balance sheets fragile; its terms are one of the best barometers of trade confidence.
On the record
What this desk filed in the last eight weeks, dated and sourced.
This week, August 20 to September 23
The homepage diamond chip's year-to-date figure lagged its own level
Corrected 27 October 2026: on the morning of 26 October (No. 098) the homepage NATURAL 1CT (RAPI PROXY) cell printed −5.7% YTD beside 3,876.42. That level is −6.0% on the year (3,876.42 / 4,125.20 = 0.9397), as the natural price list said; −5.7% belonged to the 18 October level, 3,891.97. The cell read −6.0% from a redeploy at about 08:22 EDT the same day. From No. 099 the build computes the figure from the level and the 1 January base in the same file. What was right as published: the level, 3,876.42, and its date.
Source: Carat Capital homepage; natural-diamond-prices.html; Carat Capital Managing Editor digest and standards audit, 2026-10-26
This week, August 20 to September 23
IGI's jewelry 'line', a superlative and a fee claim
Corrected 27 October 2026: igi-lab-grown-jewelry-grows-47-percent.html (No. 098, 26 October 2026) called IGI's lab-grown jewelry figure a 'line', called it IGI's fastest-growing segment while its own table showed coloured gemstones up sevenfold, and said IGI's revenue 'is fees'. It now says segment and fastest-growing diamond segment, and uses the release's own description of IGI. What was right as published: every figure.
Source: Carat Capital, a-igi-lab-grown-jewelry-grows-47-percent.html; Carat Capital standards audit, 2026-10-26; IGI release to NSE
This week, August 20 to September 23
A council's 'potentially' printed as CIBJO's next step
Corrected 27 October 2026: lab-grown-council-threatens-action-over-synthetic.html (No. 098, 26 October 2026) headed a section 'The 4Cs are next.' and said CIBJO's report 'would deny' lab-grown stones the grading terms; the council's statement says 'potentially preventing'. The page also said the notice 'names' trade organisations (it names none) and that a misled buyer 'could ground' a claim (the council says 'may constitute' injury). All three now follow the statement. What was right as published: every figure and the quote.
Source: Carat Capital, a-lab-grown-council-threatens-action-over-synthetic.html; Carat Capital standards audit, 2026-10-26; Diamond Producers Council statement
This week, August 20 to September 23
A Surat owner said to have left, printed as fact
Corrected 26 October 2026: surat-diamond-unit-shuts-with-ten-lakh-unpaid.html (No. 097, 25 October 2026) opened 'The owner left.' and headed a section 'Part-paid, then gone'. The Indian Express reports that the owner 'allegedly fled', and police call him untraceable; the page no longer states his departure as fact. It also said police gave ₹14.50 lakh as the total; the police sentence uses it as the unpaid sum, while the union calls it the pending total of which ₹4.50 lakh was paid. Both readings are now printed. What was right as published: every figure.
Source: Carat Capital, a-surat-diamond-unit-shuts-with-ten-lakh-unpaid.html; Carat Capital standards audit, 2026-10-25; Indian Express re-fetched (715,025 bytes)
This week, August 20 to September 23
GJEPC's holiday-season line, said more than the release
Clarified 26 October 2026: india-us-gem-and-jewellery-exports-near-three-billion.html (No. 097, 25 October 2026) called October 'the first month of the US holiday shipping season'. GJEPC's release says only that the US holiday season is approaching; the watch line now says that. No figure changed.
Source: Carat Capital, a-india-us-gem-and-jewellery-exports-near-three-billion.html; Carat Capital standards audit, 2026-10-25; GJEPC release (34,368 bytes)