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Lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems

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Re: Lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems

#3
> De Beers fights fakes with technology as China’s lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems

From what I understand, these gems are actually better than natural ones, since they're 100% pure. Maybe it's time to call lab-grown diamonds "real" and mined ones "fake".

Re: Lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems

#5
From the article:

>The arrival of lab-grown diamonds has challenged the widely-held assumption that diamond prices could only go up

I'll admit I don't know a lot about the diamond market and perhaps I'm misinformed, but how on earth was this a widely held assumption? In a world where people are increasingly aware that De Beers and other companies hold major stockpiles of diamonds solely to keep the price inflated, and when man made diamonds for industrial purposes have been a thing for a long time?

Re: Lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems

#6

> De Beers fights fakes with technology as China’s lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems From what I understand, these gems are actually better than natural ones, since they're 100% pure. Maybe it's time to call lab-grown diamonds "real" and mined ones "fake".

Yep I am calling man-made gems “real” diamonds from now on.

Der Bers, take that! (I hope your social listening catches this)

Re: Lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems

#7
post #2

> De Beers is fighting Chinese lab-grown diamonds And I hope they lose. https://priceonomics.com/post/45768546804/diamonds-are-bulls... (and HN comments on original posting 2013-03-19 -- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5403988 )

I also highly recommend Edward Epstein's Atlantic article on this too: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have-yo...

One of the best pieces of long-form journalism ever published, without a doubt.

Re: Lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems

#8

From the article: >The arrival of lab-grown diamonds has challenged the widely-held assumption that diamond prices could only go up I'll admit I don't know a lot about the diamond market and perhaps I'm misinformed, but how on earth was this a widely held assumption? In a world where people are increasingly aware that De Beers and other companies hold major stockpiles of diamonds solely to keep the price inflated, an…

Probably because these are both relatively new developments? I'd wager that as recently as 5-10 years ago these were much less of an issue.

Re: Lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems

#9
About 10 years ago, I had to deal with a vivid bunch of folks from Belgium. Some of them were related to the diamond industry in Antwerp. One just came back from Congo where he got screwed by a local hi-tech crook that managed to fake a diamond using a plain kitchen microwave oven.

No idea how authentic his story was, but the microwave fake stuck in my memory.

Re: Lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems

#10

> De Beers fights fakes with technology as China’s lab-grown diamonds threaten viability of the real gems From what I understand, these gems are actually better than natural ones, since they're 100% pure. Maybe it's time to call lab-grown diamonds "real" and mined ones "fake".

>> From what I understand, these gems are actually better than natural ones...

Yes, for decades they claimed clarity and purity to be indicators of the highest quality. Now that humans can manufacture them with better specs than nature, they're shifting to claim that "natural" is better. In the end it's a pretty carbon lattice.

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