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by Will Purcell

The diamond and specialty minerals stocks box score on Friday was a positive 100-74-136 as the TSX Venture Exchange rose six points to 557. Yes indeed, it does appear that rough diamond prices have bottomed, at least for the holiday season, according to the latest update of Paul Zimnisky's global rough diamond price index. Mr. Zimnisky did peel 0.4 point from last week's cheerful setting, based on late-to-arrive data, but the current information pushed the index up 1.2 points from there. And so, the index now sits at 155.2 points, up 0.7 per cent this week.

Better yet, Mr. Zimnisky says rough diamond prices are up 1.1 per cent over the past month and are also in the black by 0.5 per cent over the past three months. It is likely no coincidence that the 2023 low of 152.2 points occurred in mid-October, coinciding with the start of a two-month voluntary moratorium on purchases of rough by the Indian diamond sector.

It is also worth noting that rough prices typically do well in the final few months of one year and the first few months of the next, as retailers look to replenish their shelves after the holidays and manufacturers acquire the raw goods needed to replace their inventories. (Recall that the 2023 high of 185.9 points occurred in the first few days of March, while the all-time high of 207.3 points occurred in mid-February of 2022.)

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