One of the biggest issues in an industry that deals with high-cost items, is nonpayment by clients. A default can be devastating, if not fatal, to a company that operates with narrow margins. To combat that, a gentleman by the name of J.A. McCloy formed an organization that collects and shares financial information on jewelry companies in 1884. That organization is the Jewelers Board of Trade (JBT).
Prices of smaller goods, one carat and below, completed six months of price increases in January. Larger goods, however, which suffered from price declines late in 2018, continued to decline in January, according to the Mercury Diamond Global Tracker™ (MDGT™). The price changes were just shy of a single point for those that increased in price, while the declines were more dramatic.
The Jewelers Vigilance Committee (JVC) was formed in the US more than 100 years ago to provide education and self-regulation to jewelers and other members of the American jewelry industry. Most importantly, it helps the jewelry industry with legal matters such as compliance.
The wholesale diamond market was slow in January. This is seasonal and somewhat expected, however in January retailers generally replenish their inventories and prepare for Valentine’s Day, and this happened only to a limited extent. The world’s largest jewelry retailers reported a decline in diamond jewelry sales in December, so the issue may be goods being off loaded back into the wholesale market.
A very new organization, the China Diamond & Gem Exchange (MDGE) was established in 2018 in Macau as an international diamond and gem trading center. It was established against the backdrop of the growing diamond trade in China and a desire to attract a wider audience of traders to the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area by creating a recognized exchange for diamond and gem trading in Macau.