Greetings for the New Year

The diamond industry is an international industry that reaches across the borders of our global world. It bridges across cultures, nations, religious beliefs, languages and ways of life. The information we share comes from many and diverse sources and spreads around the world to spark the industry.

A common denominator is our business calendar, which starts in January and ends in December. Through this annual cycle, we have commonly made efforts to keep the flow of the value chain from mining through polishing to retailing for the end consumer.

Throughout the passing year, as in all years past, we have all put our best foot forward and invested our best efforts to reach our goals no matter the outcome. By that, each and every one of us contributed to our joint effort to bring a remarkable product to the retail market. I would therefore like to congratulate everybody who has been contributing to these efforts for all that they have done in the past year and wish you all a restful holiday. We can take advantage of this time away from our daily business activities and contemplate our actions in the ending year – we can examine our success and the lessons it provides and then apply it to doing better business next year. 

I would like to point out optional points to consider:

• Liquidity, financing and cash flow are probably among the most important issues we will have to address in the coming year. We should all want to apply all the knowledge and experience that we’ve gathered during many years of business activities to make wise decisions when we buy or sell rough and polished diamonds, while making sure that we are managing our cash flow in a responsible way. 
• Transparency is of outmost importance to regain the trust of the banks and encourage them to finance the industry.
• Transparency will also open us to new outlets for our product. We need the full trust of consumers to increase our businesses. The buyers' appetite for diamonds should never dwindle: nurturing and enhancing it is of the out most importance if we want to maintain or even increase demand.
• An ongoing dialogue between the different sectors of the diamond industry will create a synergy required to keep the value chain flowing properly.
• We want to analyze the passing year so that we fully understand it and draw the relevant conclusions from the current situation in order to make sure that the coming years' performance will outdo this one's.
• I feel that we should reflect upon and clarify to ourselves the three diamond outlet categories: Diamonds for Fashion jewellery, Diamonds as a high Luxury product, and the Crystal Clear value of diamonds as a tool for considering diamonds as an additional potential asset for wealth preservation. The Crystal Clear value proposition has the potential of becoming a historical game changer, transforming the face of the diamond industry. Backed by full transparency, it has the power to change banks' attitude towards the industry as well as the power to open an additional market and keep the end users interested in consuming diamonds.

My best wishes to all. May all of us begin 2015 with renewed energies and an enhanced inspiration to ignite the coming year with great profitability and success.

The views expressed here are solely those of the author in his private capacity. No one should act upon any opinion or information in this website without consulting a professional qualified advisor.