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Three cheers from the DTC cocktail party
This past Friday, I got the chance to sit down and more thoroughly review the speeches made by Nicky Oppenheimer, Gareth Penny and Varda Shine at the recent Diamond Trading Co. sightholder cocktail party, the DTC's annual get-together gala held...
This past Friday, I got the chance to sit down and more thoroughly review the speeches made by Nicky Oppenheimer, Gareth Penny and Varda Shine at the recent Diamond Trading Co. sightholder cocktail party, the DTC's annual get-together gala held in London on Jan. 19.
Here are a few things that caught my eye:
* It seems that De Beers is making positive progress on refinancing its $1.5 billion debt facility with the banks before it becomes due in March.
Oppenheimer alluded to the debt in his speech given at the party last Tuesday when he said, "You will doubtless have read the press coverage concerning the shareholders [De Beers is owned 45 percent by mining company Anglo American and 40 percent by the Oppenheimer family, with the remaining
15 percent belonging to the Government of Botswana] and of the decisions we have to take. While I can't comment at this stage, as we still have to finalize discussions with our bankers, let me assure you that whatever decision the three shareholders take, we will do so with an eye to what is right for De Beers, and by extension, its clients and employees, and to what is necessary to ensure that it is optimally placed for recovery."
And this morning I arrived to a flood of "De Beers" Google alerts on the same subject, such as this one.
* In Penny's speech, it's worth noting that he twice referenced the International Diamond Board (IDB - is there anything in this industry that's safe from acronym-ization?).
The IDB is the industry body that's supposed to be coming down the pike with a marketing campaign for diamonds that will generically promote the stones in the same way that the star-studded "Got Milk?" campaign organized by the California Milk Processor Board promoted milk, with no company names attached.
Penny mentioned the IDB while he was listing ways in which De Beers was working with others in the industry to drive demand for diamonds at the retail level, and also said that "fully operational IDB initiatives to provide PR activity" was part of the holistic strategy needed to brand diamonds as "treasures of nature."
The fact that Penny brought up the IDB twice struck me as particularly interesting since, last I heard, the organization had hit what seemed to be a permanent roadblock erected by Russia, and that IDB leaders needed to work out the
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details with the new leadership at Alrosa.
However, National Jeweler learned recently that the Russians are still at the table on this one and the IDB isn't dead yet.
I'm sure there'll be more updates on the IDB in the near future.
However, National Jeweler learned recently that the Russians are still at the table on this one and the IDB isn't dead yet.
I'm sure there'll be more updates on the IDB in the near future.
*In Shine's speech, she said that the DTC is preparing for its new sightholder contract period, which makes sense given that current sightholders are only under contract through 2011.
Shine said the DTC now is working "to simplify the process" and will be releasing more details "after the first quarter."
It will be interesting to see what happens there as well.
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