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De Beers to Auction More Polished Diamonds
The diamond miner and marketer will hold two auctions this month, one Thursday and the second on Aug. 24.

London--De Beers will hold more sales of polished diamonds cut from its own rough this week.
The next auction will take place online on Thursday, and all the stones in the sale will have two grading reports, one from the Gemological Institute of America and the other from the International Institute of Diamond Grading & Research, which is De Beers’ lab.
The company said it will be offering more goods for sale this time than it did at its first auction of polished diamonds, which took place in June. De Beers said it was “encouraged” by the initial response to that auction, though it declined to provide further details on the sell-through rate.
In addition, De Beers is slated to hold an auction of high-quality diamonds from other sellers on Aug. 24. The headlining stone at that sale will be a 15-carat rectangle-cut internally flawless fancy yellow diamond. There also is a 2-carat fancy pinkish-purple cushion-cut diamond.
De Beers announced that it would begin selling other companies’ polished diamonds in November 2016, but only fancy colors or white diamonds that are five carats or larger in size.
The first sale took place in June and included about 50 lots. De Beers said several of the flagship diamonds sold, including a 7.21-carat D flawless pear-shaped diamond, the top lot.
The polished sales are a departure for the company, which, for years, exclusively sold its rough diamonds to a set list of clients--called sightholders--that cut, polished and then sold them.
For information on how to register as a buyer for De Beers auctions, visit DeBeersGroup.com/auctionsales.
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