2023-12-15 17:14 ET - Market Summary
by Will Purcell
The diamond and specialty minerals stocks box score on Friday was a mediocre 73-93-144 as the TSX Venture Exchange fell three points to 530. Hallelujah -- perhaps the corner has been turned! Not only did Paul Zimnisky's global rough diamond price index move higher this week, but he also adjusted away most of the losses over the past two weeks thanks to some cheerful but late data. And so, the index now stands at 154.4 points, a point higher than the adjusted value and 1.8 points higher than where he thought it was a week ago.
Mr. Zimnisky's calculations now have rough diamond prices up 0.6 per cent over the past month and 1.4 per cent higher than their two-year low of 152.2 points, set in mid-October at the start of a two-month-long voluntary moratorium on purchases by the Indian diamond industry. Of course, the road home is long, as the index still is 25.6 per cent lower than its all-time high set in February of 2022, when it sat at 207.3 points.
Mr. Zimnisky is not alone. The IDEX diamond index, which charts the prices of polished diamonds, has bounced convincingly off its early November low of 107.11 points, ending the first week of December at 109.62 points, a gain of 2.3 per cent. While that is more energetic a rise than rough diamond prices achieved, remember that the IDEX index also had a harder fall -- a nearly one-third drop -- from its two-year high of 158.39 points set in early March of 2022.
The IDEX data show that the recovery is occurring with smaller gems, not large diamonds, but remember that small and lower-quality gems bore the brunt of the decline, especially when the Indian sector sat on the sidelines the past two months. While prices for large and higher-valued diamonds remain flattish, miners, jewellers and analysts alike are all champing at the bit in anticipation of a turnaround.