De Beers warns that weak rupee may take sparkle out of diamond sales
The world’s largest source of rough diamonds by value is on track to match or beat the full-year sales for 2017 but much rides on India.
The latest rough diamond sales from De Beers, the world’s largest source of rough diamonds by value, put it on track to match or beat the full-year sales for 2017, but weakness in the rupee could derail sales. De Beers, which is 85%-owned by Anglo American, said it had achieved sales of $475m for the eighth of 10 annual sales during the month to October 12. De Beers holds large four-day sales events in the Botswana capital of Gaborone called sights, but it does sell diamonds between those events. In the seventh sales cycle of 2018, De Beers recorded revenue of $503m. "Although down on the last sale, this is in line with seasonal trends and importantly avoided the dip from last year," said RBC Capital Markets analyst Tyler Broda, adding that it was likely De Beers had sold some of the diamonds it had deferred in the previous sales window during the October period. "There is likely an element that De Beers pushed through some of the deferrals from last sale though which has smoothed ...
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