Quantcast
Auction Results
Marion Maneker0May 16, 2012

Sotheby’s Geneva Jewels = $108.3m

Sotheby’s released figures for its Geneva sales of gems and jewelry. Less eye-catching in terms of price but possibly more important for understanding the direction of the jewelry market was the white-glove sale of items from the personal collection of Suzanne Belperron. Sixty of the designer’s own items made $3.45m, well above the pre-sale price tags:

Sotheby’s set a new world record of $108,377,219 for a various owner jewellery sale, with the conclusion of its two-day Magnificent Jewels and Noble Jewels Sale, surpassing the record set by Sotheby’s Geneva in November 2010 of $105 million. Over the two days 24 lots sold for over $1 million. The Beau Sancy, one of the most important royal diamonds to ever come to auction, sold for CHF 9,042,500 ($9,699,618). The result achieved by the celebrated jewel brought the total for the May Jewellery auctions to an outstanding total of CHF 104,298,625 ($111,836,526), almost doubling the pre-sale low estimate of CHF 54 -85 million

 

Auction Results
Marion Maneker0December 13, 2011

Christie’s NY Jewels (Liz Taylor) = $116m

Auction Results
Marion Maneker0November 29, 2011

Christie’s HK Jewelry = HK$644m ($82.7m)

The Chinese appetite for big stones and jewelry continues to grow as Christie’s sold $82.7m worth of gems and jewelry in Hong Kong this week, including a record for emerald pendant earrings and a pair of diamonds that came in together at 71cts and $16m.

Top Ten Lots for Christie’s Hong Kong Nov 11 Jewelry Sale

General
Marion Maneker0November 21, 2011

Graff’s Spree

Reuters validates Laurence Graff’s plans to raise $1b in a public offering in Asia to expand his diamond business further in Asia:

Graff Diamonds plans to raise about $1 billion in a Hong Kong listing next year, a move to fund further expansion in Asia and capitalize on booming demand for high-end gems in China and India.

“I think it is a clever move because he is number one today. He still has room to expand everywhere,” Eric Valdieu, a jewelry expert formerly with Christie’s who has launched an investment fund “Divine Jewels”, told Reuters.

“It is a very expensive business. Therefore, if he wants to go faster he needs large financial support,” he said.

Graff’s glittering stores sit on the world’s most exclusive shopping streets, including the posh rue du Rhone in Geneva.

“When I see his inventory, the quality of his merchandise, the beauty of his shops, how cleverly everything is run, I can only suggest to people to go for it — if people want to invest with a retailer,” Valdieu said.

“They are investing with someone who knows what he’s doing,” the Frenchman added.

Graff pays $4 million for white diamond…by Graff (Reuters)

Auction Results
Marion Maneker0November 17, 2011

Christie’s Geneva Jewels = CHF56.2m

 

 

 

 

General
Saul Singer0November 07, 2011

Diamonds Are Anglo’s Best Friend

Saul Singer is a partner at Fusion Alternatives Investment Management, an innovative investment house and the leading alternative investment asset manager specialising in investment diamonds. Fusion Alternatives does not hold any diamond inventory and aims to give expert and independent insight into the global diamond market. Visit ww.fusionalternatives.com for further information.

Anglo American Plc has agreed to buy the Oppenheimer family’s 40 percent stake in De Beers for $5.1 billion. This deal marks the end of the iconic century-old involvement of the Oppenheimer’s in the diamond industry and giving Anglo as much as an 85 percent stake in the world’s largest diamond company. Undoubtedly this announcement will leave an indelible effect on the industry and clearly signals the “changing of the guard” with many within the close-knit diamond trading industry likening this announcement to the abdication of a monarch.

Whilst the financial analysts begin to postulate about who got the better end of the deal and the diamond market is left to ponder the future direction of their business in a post-Oppenheimer diamond industry, two fundamental issues are already as clear as day. One, the diamond industry is becoming more and more streamlined and two, the diamond industry has just been catapulted onto the radar screen of the professional investment community.

The Anglo stock responded positively to the news today rising almost three percent to £2,390 in intra-day trading and easing back to £2,366 in late afternoon trading ending the day up 1.2 percent. Commenting on the acquisition Cynthia Caroll, Chief Executive of Anglo alluded to the more simplified and integrated ownership structure the deal will bring to De Beers. Notwithstanding the benefits of the simplified structure, the buy-out is a clear and aggressive bullish play on diamonds by one of the world’s leading diversified mining and minerals company. In her announcement to the market, Caroll noted that the deal marks Anglo’s commitment to “an industry with highly attractive long term supply and demand fundamentals” and “captures the potential presented by a rapidly evolving diamond market.”

Beyond the nostalgic sentiments the deal may conjure up for the traditional diamond trading markets around the globe, the news bodes very well for the emerging international investment diamond market. The increased exposure the announcement will provide for investment diamonds in the broader financial market is yet another factor driving the increased awareness of investment diamonds as an outperforming alternative investment asset class. Coupled with its safe-haven characteristics and strong underlying fundamentals, the investment diamond market is set to become a hot topic this Holiday Season with potential capital inflow ready to surpass that of less liquid and transparent tangible assets such as wine and art which themselves have experienced exponential growth over the last few years.

Economic Trends
Saul Singer0October 24, 2011

Where Are the True Diamond Investments?

Saul Singer is a partner at Fusion Alternatives, an innovative investment house and the leading alternative investment asset manager specialising in investment diamonds. Fusion Alternatives does not hold any diamond inventory and aims to give expert and independent insight into the global diamond market. Visit www.fusionalternatives.com for further information.

Investment diamonds are grabbing the headlines once again with the news of some significant diamonds coming up for auction. Kicking off the upcoming high-end magnificent jewels autumn auction season is a pair of round D Flawless diamonds weighing 35.77 and 35.61 carats each being auctioned by Christies. According to Christies these are the largest pair of this type of diamonds to ever be auctioned and have an estimated value of seven to nine million US dollars each. Heading the list of top diamond items being offered by Sotheby’s this autumn is a spectacular 110.30 carat fancy vivid yellow VVS1 pear-shaped diamond set to fetch up to $15 million.

With all financial markets taking a bit of a beating over the last few months financial analysts and commentators are eagerly looking for robust alternatives. The solid risk adjusted-returns of diamonds coupled with the fact that demand is set to outstrip supply into the medium term are making some analysts to take a closer look at the diamond market. Moreover, the safe-haven characteristics of diamonds are something that definitely speaks to jittery investment market participants. We are consequently seeing a stronger awareness of diamonds as an alternative investment with more and more analysts becoming more bullish on supposed diamond stocks such as Harry Winston, Tiffany and even BHP and Rio Tinto.

Amidst all the hype around the prospects of the diamond market what seems to be overlooked is that there is currently no stock or even ETF that provides investors with a clear play on diamond prices. The world’s largest listed diamond miners are BHP and Rio Tinto, however their diamond interests are merely a small component of their overall mining interests and thus an investment in these stocks do not provide any gearing to diamond prices. Conversely an investment in smaller independent diamond miners exposes investors to significant topographical, sovereign and operational risks and hence dilutes the exposure to diamond prices. The story is similar at the retail-end with an investment in stocks such as Tiffany and Blue Nile whereby the investor is more exposed to specific niches of the consumer retail markets as opposed to diamond prices. Perhaps the stock that best represents the trends in the diamond market is Harry Winston as it has both mining and retail interests how
ever even an investment in this stock provides investors with a limited exposure to only the very high-end of the diamond market.

An investor looking to the ETF market would not have much more luck attaining a direct play on diamond prices as all diamond ETF’s currently offered do not provide investors with an exposure across the entire investment diamond market but rather a very narrow band of high-end unique and scarce diamonds which have low liquidity and no real price transparency.

Auction Results
Marion Maneker0October 06, 2011

Sotheby’s HK Mag Jewels = HK$510m (US$65.5m)

 

Economic Trends, Market Reports
Marion Maneker0September 29, 2011

Diamonds Are a Lender’s Best Friend

There’s an interesting side note in two recent stories about art loans: diamonds are increasingly being used as substantial collateral against short-term liquidity loans. Here’s the Wall Street Journal on pawn shops doing brisk business in loans to the wealthy against their high value assets:

“There is a certain type of affluent customer that will not go into a pawn shop,” owner Todd Hills told Newsweek in 2010. “And they don’t have a $50 or $100 problem. Maybe they have a $100,000 problem.” The granddaddy of all the plutocrat pawnshops is Beverly Loan Co., in Beverly Hills, which bills itself as “the Pawnshop to the Stars” has been helping the cash-strapped and famous for nearly 75 years.

Owner Jordan Tabach-Bank told CNN in 2009 that he was “giving more loans and they’re bigger than ever.”

“I recently had a hedge-fund manager in here getting a large loan on his collection of diamonds,” he said.

Now listen to Reuters on the rise of loans against luxury assets:

Martin Rapaport, chairman of diamond services company Rapaport Group, says owners of top-quality precious stones have also started to use these as collateral in financial transactions, repeating a trend he saw in the first days of the crisis in 2008.

“We know it happened in 2008 and I expect to see more of (it) this year. The stock market fell so much recently so these people are looking at tangible assets like high end diamonds,” he told Reuters.

At the root of this trend is the fact that such assets are proving better stores of value than investments such as equities. Their value is still appreciating, driven by huge demand from the fast-growing rich of Asia and Russia. David Prager, director of communications at diamond miner De Beers, said the firm’s prices rose by an “unprecedented” 35 percent in the first half of 2011. “That was driven by big increases in consumer demand, particularly in China and India.”

Pawn Shops for the (Formerly) Rich (Wealth Report/Wall Street Journal)

How to Borrow $10 Million (Reuters)

General
Marion Maneker0September 12, 2011

Decoding the World of Investable Diamonds

Saul Singer is a partner at Fusion Alternatives, an innovative investment house and the leading alternative investment asset manager specialising in investment diamonds. Click on his photo (left)  to see a presentation on the investable diamond market.

There has been much fanfare in the international financial press regarding the emergence of diamonds as an alternative investment asset class. Their perceived ‘safe-haven’ characteristics are what have made investment diamonds a hot topic in the wake of the uncertain macro-economic sentiment sweeping across the globe. However when one delves beyond the grandiose proclamations and superlatives by market players regarding the ease of gaining a true exposure to investment diamond price movements one is confronted with a complex trading market that requires expert and independent investment diamond professionals to navigate through the intricacies of the global diamond market.

There are literally thousands of categories of both rough and polished diamonds with only a tight band of diamond classes with homogeneous gemological characteristics that qualify as being investable. Moreover, one must be aware of the price transparency and liquidity of various classes of diamonds which are critical factors when assessing the investability of diamonds.

Interestingly, the recent wave of interest in investment diamonds by the broader investment community has been spurred by some major players within the global diamond industry who are looking to capitalize on the emergence of the diamond investment market as either an alternative sales channel for their diamond inventory or as a source of external capital investment at a time when certain sectors of the diamond market are softening.

Independence is paramount when assessing the viability of a foray into the investment diamond market. To be sure, investment diamonds definitely do present a very interesting investment proposition with strong market fundamentals and a positive projected outlook for continued strong appreciation into the medium-term. However, independent and deep investment diamond market intelligence and expertise is a critical success factor for any prudent exposure to investment diamonds especially in softening market conditions.

Just as it takes an objective and discerning ‘eye’ that has mustered years of specialized training and experience to properly value a diamond, so too does it take an independent investment diamond expert to adequately assess potential risks and subsequent returns of an entry into the investment diamond market.

Investing in Physical Diamonds (Viddler/Objective Capital Conference)

« Older Posts
Untitled Document