by WarSanchez
I think most people, even the younger generations have hear the saying “A Diamond is Forever”.
It was made famous be the De Beers Group, which was at it’s peak the sole power player in the diamond market. It was founded in 1888 by Cecil Rhodes, please read his wiki, it contains a lot of information that I would rather not have to type out and/or get accused of plagiarizing. I’m not a Rhodes Scholar or anything, I’m just trying to point some things out for the sake of conversation. (Ever wonder where all that money they have to give comes from?) It was also helped started by two other interesting players: Alfred Beit, again there is a lot of interesting info on him in his wiki take a gander if you don’t mind, and lastly the Rothschilds!.
No I’m not making shit up, it’s an actual fact that these three power players started the De Beers Group.
Anyways let me get back to on track!
To make a TLDR of a VERY long and boring history De Beers has had a monopoly of the diamond market for a VERY long time, practically since 1888. They have manipulated the rarity of diamonds by artificially creating scarcity, price fixed to cut out their competition, and at times, withheld industrial diamonds during war times to price gouge nations out of a some sweet loot.
More recently tho, De Beers had seen their share of the diamond market fall to about 35%, which is quite a fall from grace. The reason they have a smaller share of the market is because Russia has discovered large diamond mines and China has been able to make lab generated diamonds which are superior to natural diamonds.
Although Russia has large mines, China is what scares the shit out of De Beers. Why? Because a lab created diamond is impossible to distinguish from a real diamond, because it technically is a real diamond, just not a natural occurring one.
Ok ok, I’m starting to ramble and these energy drinks are fucking with me let me get to the point. Back in the day, De Beers would flood the market for a bit when they were threatened by competition. They would temporarily drive the prices down so much that their competition would fail because they wouldn’t make money selling them at the newer cheaper prices. Once the competition was taken care of, it was business as usual, the price would rocket back up and diamonds would become scarce again.
That is what is happening now, but with lab diamonds. Imagine being able to buy a one Karat diamond that was virtually perfect in every way. Well dream no more! De Beers has made LightBox Jewerly. What kind of fortune would you have to shell out for such a perfect one Karat diamond? How about a measly $800.
That’s right, right now, De Beers is currently trying to flood the market with a VERY cheap lab created diamond to be able to kill all of their competitors. I really think they are facing a very uncertain future where despite diamonds being forever, their market share is drying up and they have to do something drastic like becoming the largest player of lab grown diamonds to be able to continue selling their natural diamonds as well.
It might not seem like a big deal, but it really is. De Beers is one of the shittiest companies in the history of forever and is finally getting their comeuppance, let’s just see if it happens in our life time.
I apologize in advance for me sleep deprived rant, but shopping for an engagement ring has pissed me off and I stumbled into this because I had also seen a frontpage post about diamonds and shit.
If you read this far you’re a real one. Thanks.