Lucara Sells 9.46 carat Blue Diamond for $4.5 Million Dollars

December 10th, 2012 by Noam Flint

Usually on the blog we cover diamonds sold at the Sotheby’s and Christie’s auctions. However, this auction is a bit different.

Last month a 9.46 carat blue diamond was found at the Karowe mine owned by Lucara. It was to be auctioned at the tender, which they held on November 26th along with an additional 57,000 carats that were mined.

9.46 carat Blue Diamond rough by Lucara

9.46 carat Blue Diamond rough by Lucara

A diamond tender is an auction for rough diamonds among diamond dealers and manufacturers.

A week after the rare blue was mined, a 10.48 carat deep blue diamond has broken auction records and was sold for the outstanding amount 10.86 Million Dollars.

As a result we have projected that the great timing of the auction will most likely have an effect on the Lucara tender and push the price expectations of the polished blue diamonds even higher.

In a way, in rare diamonds such as the above blue diamonds, the price of the polished diamonds sold sets the price of the rough and not the other way around as expected.

Now that manufactures know that there are buyers willing to pay over a million dollars per carat for a rare blue diamond,they will be willing to buy the rough for… $477,272 per carat ($4.5 Million Dollars total).

Do not forget that the price that was paid was price per rough carat. Which means that the polished diamond’s cost price per carat is by far higher – again showing the expectations.

Lets Finish with Some Proportions…

The entire sale of the 57,000 carats grossed $17.4 Million Dollars.
The 9.46 carat blue diamond was sold for $4.5 million.
Impressive don’t you think…?