Diamonds – Mining, Lab-Grown and Conflict/Blood – Page 43

INTRODUCING SPACE DIAMONDS: WHY YOU MIGHT WANT A MOISSANITE ENGAGEMENT RING – by Charlie Boyd (Harpers Bazaar U.K. – June 15, 2016)

June 16, 2016

http://www.harpersbazaar.co.uk/

Moissanite, a lab-created stone derived from outer space with similar properties to diamonds, is proving an affordable alternative to traditional engagement rings

We automatically associate engagement rings with the image of a diamond solitaire: sparkly, durable, highly valuable and hewn from the earth. Diamonds have a vast heritage; age-old, flecked with ethical complications, but they ultimately still resonate as the most-prized precious stones and therefore remain the favourite choice for wedding jewellery.

If, however, you trawl Instagram for engagement ring inspiration, you might be confused to see similar-looking sparkle with the hashtag #moissanite. Meet the diamond alternative seducing the Millennial jewellery market: a laboratory-created stone that doesn’t require mining, has similar chemical properties to diamonds and is a fraction of the price.

Diamonds Are Putin’s Best Bet to Entice Wary Investors to Russia – by Yuliya Fedorinova and Stephen Bierman (Bloomberg News – June 15, 2016)

June 15, 2016

http://www.bloomberg.com/

President Vladimir Putin is trying to woo foreign investors into the battered Russian economy by offering a chunk of the world’s biggest miner of diamonds.

Russia needs cash to help fill a hole in its budget, the result of a collapse in revenue from plunging oil prices. Putin has proposed selling stakes in state-controlled companies including banks and oil producers. At a time when global money managers remain wary, the one asset that may hold the most appeal is a stake in Alrosa PJSC, valued at more than $860 million.

The company, owned 44 percent by the federal government, is the world’s largest producer of rough diamonds and had record profit of 49.2 billion rubles ($750 million) in the first quarter. The shares are up 23 percent this year. While the timing of the sale hasn’t been announced, Economy Minister Alexey Ulyukaev says Alrosa is a “good candidate” to be one of the first on the auction block.

[Diamonds/DeBeers] No Slogan Is Forever – by Stephen Rego (Business World India – June 14, 2016)

June 14, 2016

http://businessworld.in/

The number 1 advertising slogan of the last century, the iconic ‘A Diamond is Forever’, will henceforth no longer be the vanguard message of the diamond industry as the Diamond Producers Association unveils a new platform to redefine diamonds for the millennial generation.

A little over a week ago, the Diamond Producers Association (DPA), an organisation set up last year by the world’s largest diamond mining companies, including De Beers, revealed that it would be adopting a new campaign platform to promote diamonds among the millennial generation. That new platform is “Real is Rare. Real is Diamond”.

Thus, ‘A Diamond is Forever’, the four words that were the cornerstone of all global marketing campaigns launched by De Beers in various parts of the world since 1948, will now no longer enjoy a monopoly in generic promotions, though they will probably still be used by De Beers to push its own Forevermark brand of diamonds and diamond jewellery.

The reason for the shift, the DPA says, is to redefine diamonds for the 21st century, giving them new meaning and aligning them with the perceptions and thinking of the new millennial generation.

Zimbabwe villagers displaced by diamond mining hope to see action from government – by Andrew Mambondiyani (Reuters U.S. – June 13, 2016)

June 13, 2016

http://www.reuters.com/

MUTARE, Zimbabwe (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Villagers re-located to a sprawling government-owned farm complex in eastern Zimbabwe to make way for the nation’s biggest diamond field are hoping that President Robert Mugabe’s move to take control of the valued resource will benefit them.

More than 1,000 families were moved in 2009 from a village adjacent to the Chiadzwa diamond field in Marange to Arda Transau, a 12,000 hectare farm settlement about 40 km (25 miles) to the north with promises of a better life.

Arda Transau was billed as a new township with tarred roads, shops and health clinics – but seven years later the villagers say they have yet to see the promised education and health facilities while their homes are crumbling and food is scarce.

Dominion beats fiscal Q1 forecasts despite lower sales, Misery production ahead of plan – by Henry Lazenby (MiningWeekly.com – June 9, 2016)

June 9, 2016

http://www.miningweekly.com/page/americas-home

TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – The NYSE-quoted stock of Canadian diamond producer Dominion Diamond Corp on Thursday rose more than 7% to $11.64 apiece after the company late on Wednesday reported a net loss beating analyst expectations.

The Yellowknife, Northwest Territories-headquartered miner, which owns an 89%-stake in the Ekati mine and is in a 40/60 joint-venture partnership with mining major Rio Tinto at the Diavik mine, reported a net loss attributable to shareholders in the quarter ended April 30 of $1-million, or $0.01 a share, compared with a net income of $12-million, or $0.14 a share diluted a year earlier.

Wall Street analysts had on average expected a loss of $0.10 a share. Dominion reported a 5% year-over-year decline in revenue to $178.3-million. It explained that despite declaring commercial production at the Misery Main kimberlite pipe ahead of schedule in May as a result of changes to the prioritisation of mining activities during the quarter, the transitional period at Ekati continued to impact earnings.

[Zimbabwe diamonds] Women Brave Challenges To Scrape A Living In Mining – by Dumisani Nyoni (Radio Voice Of The People – June 8, 2016)

June 9, 2016

http://www.radiovop.com/

Bulawayo, June 09, 2016 – The face of Nomusa Dube, 40, is dusted red with soil as she and her five female colleagues take a brief lunch break. They have been working since dawn on their gold claim in Esigodini, 49 kilometres from Bulawayo along the Bulawayo-Beitbridge road.

She joined the male-dominated industry in 2014 after her husband succumbed to cancer in 2013. “By that time, I saw my world crumbling as I had nowhere to turn to. Two of my children were at high school and three at primary level. Therefore, I was supposed to pay for their school fees, clothe and feed them,” Dube said, checking the sun’s position – a traditional old practice of estimating time – ready to go back to work.

She tried vending in Bulawayo, but with little success. Low returns, and constant raids from municipality police confiscating their wares sucked her strength. In 2013, government invited women to take up mining to supplement their living and Dube was one of the first to respond.

DPA REVEALS ‘REAL IS RARE’ NATURAL DIAMOND MARKETING CAMPAIGN (Diamond Intelligence.com – June 5, 2016)

June 6, 2016

http://www.diamondintelligence.com/

The Diamond Producers Association (DPA), the organization formed last year by the major diamond mining companies to promote the natural diamond industry, unveiled its new marketing platform for diamonds during a special presentation to members of the jewelry industry at the JCK show in Las Vegas. The DPA team, led by CEO Jean-Marc Lieberherr, outlined plans for the first category marketing campaign in over 5 years and the very first from the DPA.

“The new platform “Real is Rare” is the result of six months of development,” says the DPA, including in-depth research into its target: millennial consumers. The platform emerges from deep insight work with the millennial audience revealing that while diamonds do have appeal for this generation, relevance and emotional engagement can be heightened via new concepts.”

Continues DPA: “Our research reveals that Millennials long for real, lasting connections with others, but struggle to make them – or to feel sure they are truly authentic – in a world of constant flux, seemingly limitless choice, and superficial interactions.

Digging for the missing $15 billion of diamond revenue in Zimbabwe – by Elisa Peter (Huffington Post – June 2, 2016)

June 3, 2016

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/

Elisa Peter is the Executive Director of Publish What You Pay.

When President Mugabe announced on his 92nd birthday, 21st February 2016, that $15 billion worth of revenues generated by the diamond industry had gone missing, the majority of Zimbabweans believed him. Zimbabwe is among the world’s ten largest producers of diamonds.

It is also one of the world’s poorest countries, ranked 156 in the 2014 Human Development Index. Every year, it extracts 4,7 million carats of diamonds, enough to produce millions of engagement rings for enamoured couples around the world. But do people in Zimbabwe benefit from this natural wealth? The answer is a resounding no.

Zimbabwe is not an isolated anomaly. Revenues generated by mining around the world have gone missing for years, the results of a vast and complex web made of illicit financial flaws, tax evasion and disrespect for the rule of law.

Sculptor of stolen $5M solid gold, diamond-encrusted eagle statue fears it will be melted down – by Douglas Quan (National Post – June 1, 2016)

June 2, 2016

http://news.nationalpost.com/

B.C. sculptor Kevin Peters turned on the TV news Monday at noon and was startled to see an image of a one-of-a-kind eagle statue he had crafted several years ago.

At that moment, the phone rang. Ron Shore, the businessman who commissioned the piece of art, was on the other end. He wasn’t his usual self. He sounded defeated.

“I lost the eagle,” Peters recalled him saying. Peters learned that Shore had been violently robbed of the solid-gold statue late Sunday in a residential neighbourhood in Ladner, a suburb south of Vancouver. “That took a minute to sink in,” he said. Official details of how the robbery went down remain murky.

UPDATE 2-Anglo American’s De Beers picks insider Cleaver as CEO (Reuters U.S. – May 27, 2016)

May 27, 2016

http://www.reuters.com/

BENGALURU/BRUSSELS, May 27 Anglo American Plc’s De Beers named insider Bruce Cleaver as chief executive of the diamond group, which the global mining company is counting on to help revive its fortunes.

Cleaver takes on the new role at a difficult time for De Beers as Diamond sales stagnated in 2015, hit by a weaker Chinese economy. However, producers are seeing scope for recovery, especially in the United States, which accounts for some 45 percent of demand.

Anglo American, which has an 85 percent stake in De Beers — the world’s largest diamond producer by value — is focusing on the diamond business after a restructuring. Cleaver, 51, was previously group director of strategy and business development at De Beers. He will take over the role on July 1, the company said on Friday.

U.N. Security Council ends more than a decade of sanctions, arms embargo on Liberia – by Louis Charbonneau (Reuters U.S. – May 25, 2016)

May 26, 2016

http://www.reuters.com/

UNITED NATIONS – The United Nations Security Council voted on Wednesday to end sanctions and an arms embargo on Liberia, citing the West African country’s successful stabilization more than a decade after a 14-year civil war that killed nearly 250,000 people.

The unanimously adopted resolution by the 15-nation council welcomed “the sustained progress made by the government of Liberia in rebuilding Liberia for the benefit of all Liberians.”

U.S. Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations David Pressman welcomed the move, saying the targeted sanctions on key individuals, the arms embargo and a ban on the export of Liberian timber and rough diamonds had contributed to Liberia’s stability.

Venezuela to rejoin global group fighting conflict diamonds (Reuters U.S. – May 24, 2016)

May 24, 2016

http://www.reuters.com/

Venezuela expects to rejoin the global watchdog established to stop trade in conflict diamonds as it seeks to resume diamond exports, its central bank director said on Tuesday.

“We are certain we will rejoin this year,” Jose Khan told Reuters on the sidelines of an international meeting of the group, known as the Kimberley Process.

Khan said Venezuela was a tiny exporter of around 3,000 carats a month until, unable to verify the legitimacy of its diamonds, it stopped issuing export certificates in 2005 and unilaterally removed itself as an active participant in the Kimberley Process in 2008.

After its withdrawal, it was not officially allowed to export diamonds, although some smuggling continued in subsequent years, traders told Reuters.

De Beers eyes diamond exploration in northern Saskatchewan – by Alex MacPherson (Saskatoon StarPhoenix – May 19, 2016)

May 20, 2016

http://thestarphoenix.com/

The world’s largest diamond mining company has entered into a multi-million-dollar agreement to look for crystallized carbon in northern Saskatchewan’s Athabasca Basin.

De Beers Canada Inc. optioned land claims south of Lake Athabasca from CanAlaska Uranium Ltd., and can now spend up to $20.4 million exploring and drilling 75 “kimberlite-style targets” identified in the 2011 Saskatchewan Geological Survey.

“We might have diamonds in Saskatchewan, and De Beers are really interested … This is an opportunity to investigate something completely new,” CanAlaska president and CEO Peter Dasler said Thursday.

Transparency equals bankability, World Diamond Congress hears – by Martin Creamer (Mining Weekly.com – May 19, 2016)

May 20, 2016

http://www.miningweekly.com/page/americas-home

JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The large number of bad-debt bankruptcies in the diamond industry in recent years was aired on the second day of the 37th World Diamond Congress in Dubai, where much emphasis was again placed on the critical need for financial transparency.

De Beers commercial development head Howard Davies drew attention to the difficulty of banks to view the diamond business as low-risk. “Transactions must all be real with real clients and real invoices. Sustainability multiplied by transparency equals bankability,” Davies told the congress, while also drawing attention to diamond portability facilitating rapid cross-border transactions.

Signet Jewellers VP David Bouffard said his company was committed to the responsible sourcing of diamonds and insisted on knowing where its diamonds were coming from and “who touches them along the way”.

Best friends? Anglo keeps De Beers’ diamonds – by Philip Blenkinsop (Reuters Africa – May 19, 2016)

May 19, 2016

http://af.reuters.com/

ANTWERP (Reuters) – Mining group Anglo American has retained De Beers as a prize asset after a radical overhaul in the belief that surging Chinese and Indian demand for diamonds will outstrip dwindling supply even after a 2015 crunch.

The group, in which Anglo American has an 85 percent stake, has seen its market share fall from over 80 percent in the 1980s to about a third now, losing it control of supply and unleashing price volatility.

Its challenges are compounded by competition from synthetic diamonds and uncertain demand from customers in the “millennial” generation, aged roughly 18 to 34. Anglo has cut the value of De Beers assets in its books each year since 2012, after it had paid $5.1 billion for a 40 percent stake.