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by Will Purcell

The diamond and specialty minerals stocks box score on Thursday was a weak 71-100-139 as the TSX Venture Exchange rose fractionally to 514. Lithium Americas Corp. (LAC) fell 49 cents to $9.83 on 563,000 shares. There has been no news since the end of October, when the company filed a prospectus covering the sale of up to $750-million (U.S.) of common and preferred shares and debt securities.

Terry Tucker's Southstone Minerals Ltd. (SML) was unchanged at one cent on 11,000 shares. The company has resumed diamond production at its Oena alluvial project in the northwestern corner of South Africa. Mining has not yet reached full speed -- that will come early next year -- but a newly certified X-ray recovery system has begun processing stockpiled material collected since mining resumed in July on the Sandberg terrace.

Southstone expects its operation will run six days a week at between 3,000 and 3,500 tonnes per day, beyond what the mine managed over the previous eight years as contract miners came and went. During its run, Oena has produced just 4,247 diamonds, although at just over two carats apiece on average, the total weight was 8,554 carats. Given the hefty average diamond weight, it is no surprise that the average diamond value tops $1,600 (U.S.) per carat, leaving Oena with a total production revenue of nearly $14-million (U.S.) from its operation so far.

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