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Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

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Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#11

Post by A_D_E_P_T »

Over the past 10 years, there has been an explosion in cheap lab diamond and moissanite producers in China and India. 10 years ago, it was hard to find quality lab diamonds at a reasonable price, and moissanite was still reasonably expensive at $400-600/ct.

Today, given cutthroat competition and "race to the bottom" pricing strategies, lab diamonds are ubiquitous, extremely high quality, and cheap. Less than $200/ct and sometimes much less: https://detail.1688.com/offer/751071300271.html

Moissanites are now less than $5/carat at retail: https://detail.1688.com/offer/586468555080.html

These are legit. I've bought some.

Within 10 years of today, I expect diamonds to lose almost all of their value. Moissanites have already become as near-worthless as synthetic rubies. This is going to open up new industrial uses for those gemstones.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#12

Post by A_D_E_P_T »

hadlock wrote: post #9
renewiltord wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where does one get these wholesale prices? And I assume that cutting happens at some cost over this?

LMGTFY gemsny.com friendlydiamonds.com lightboxjewelry.com I found a wide variety of 2-3ct diamonds for $1200-1400 there (round, brillant cut, the "classic" type), which is what a 0.75-1.0ct used to cost

Go direct to the source and you can get 2ct colorless diamonds at less than $600 shipped. e.g., https://detail.1688.com/offer/751071300271.html

There are literally hundreds of suppliers like that in China/India. Do not pay more than $1000 for a diamond of any size.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#13

Post by aidenn0 »

When TFA talks about semiconductors it really only directly compares it to silicon, when GaN is probably the nearest competitor to diamond, both in cost and performance. I believe diamond is "only" about 20x the cost of GaN; anyone know what the economics would be for substituting diamond for GaN in e.g. HVDC?

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#14

Post by aidenn0 »

throwaway48476 wrote: post #6
AStrangeMorrow wrote: post #3

I have seen lab grown diamond being quite a bit cheaper than mined ones for a while now. As in ×2 to ×3 times cheaper even. And yes, funnily it seems that the purer a diamond is (clear, few impurities etc) the higher its price/carat, until it is so pure that it means it is a lab grown diamond and not a natural one and the price drops

Veblen good.

No, Veblen bad.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#15

Post by hammock »

A_D_E_P_T wrote: post #12
hadlock wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LMGTFY gemsny.com friendlydiamonds.com lightboxjewelry.com I found a wide variety of 2-3ct diamonds for $1200-1400 there (round, brillant cut, the "classic" type), which is what a 0.75-1.0ct used to cost

Go direct to the source and you can get 2ct colorless diamonds at less than $600 shipped. e.g., https://detail.1688.com/offer/751071300271.html There are literally hundreds of suppliers like that in China/India. Do not pay more than $1000 for a diamond of any size.

Link is not working, can you tell me what to search?

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#16

Post by jajko »

A_D_E_P_T wrote: post #11

Over the past 10 years, there has been an explosion in cheap lab diamond and moissanite producers in China and India. 10 years ago, it was hard to find quality lab diamonds at a reasonable price, and moissanite was still reasonably expensive at $400-600/ct. Today, given cutthroat competition and "race to the bottom" pricing strategies, lab diamonds are ubiquitous, extremely high quality, and cheap. Less than $200/ct…

They never had any value, apart from specialized ie glass cutting tool. Only when DeBeers realized they could push some fictious heavy marketing 'to prove your worth to woman you are asking to marry' for those shiny stones nobody wanted to buy, people who didn't know better got manipulated into buying them. They are supposedly very common in universe, and probably in deeper Earth too.

Correction is healthy and benefits mankind long term, there was nothing good coming from ie impact on Africa. Nobody cared about that, so things are fixed from another direction.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#17

Post by RandomLensman »

jajko wrote: post #16
A_D_E_P_T wrote: post #11

Over the past 10 years, there has been an explosion in cheap lab diamond and moissanite producers in China and India. 10 years ago, it was hard to find quality lab diamonds at a reasonable price, and moissanite was still reasonably expensive at $400-600/ct. Today, given cutthroat competition and "race to the bottom" pricing strategies, lab diamonds are ubiquitous, extremely high quality, and cheap. Less than $200/ct…

They never had any value, apart from specialized ie glass cutting tool. Only when DeBeers realized they could push some fictious heavy marketing 'to prove your worth to woman you are asking to marry' for those shiny stones nobody wanted to buy, people who didn't know better got manipulated into buying them. They are supposedly very common in universe, and probably in deeper Earth too. Correction is healthy and benefi…

Diamonds where valued before DeBeers even existed, but diamonds in engagement rings (especially in the US) are (at least partially) from a heavy marketing push by them in the 20th century. Previously engagement rings tended to be colored gemstones.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#18

Post by andrewflnr »

throwaway48476 wrote: post #6
AStrangeMorrow wrote: post #3

I have seen lab grown diamond being quite a bit cheaper than mined ones for a while now. As in ×2 to ×3 times cheaper even. And yes, funnily it seems that the purer a diamond is (clear, few impurities etc) the higher its price/carat, until it is so pure that it means it is a lab grown diamond and not a natural one and the price drops

Veblen good.

Not really. The comment is talking about price increasing with the quality of the "good", which is perfectly conventional. The weird price cliff is especially out of place for a Veblen good.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#19

Post by tonetegeatinst »

jajko wrote: post #16
A_D_E_P_T wrote: post #11

Over the past 10 years, there has been an explosion in cheap lab diamond and moissanite producers in China and India. 10 years ago, it was hard to find quality lab diamonds at a reasonable price, and moissanite was still reasonably expensive at $400-600/ct. Today, given cutthroat competition and "race to the bottom" pricing strategies, lab diamonds are ubiquitous, extremely high quality, and cheap. Less than $200/ct…

They never had any value, apart from specialized ie glass cutting tool. Only when DeBeers realized they could push some fictious heavy marketing 'to prove your worth to woman you are asking to marry' for those shiny stones nobody wanted to buy, people who didn't know better got manipulated into buying them. They are supposedly very common in universe, and probably in deeper Earth too. Correction is healthy and benefi…

I think diamonds are used in some lathes as cutting tools. So suprising thats not more common. I though diamonds strength and iirc its heat tolerance would be attractive to the folks who cut stuff.

Re: Synthetic diamonds are now purer, more beautiful, and cheaper than mined

#20

Post by Kaijo »

This is true with some qualifications. If you're interested in the kind of investment grade diamonds that a major auction house would deal with, then you're looking at heavy weights and/or fancy colors that synthetics can't reach yet. In the diamond trade the word "paragon" is sometimes reserved for flawless or near-flawless stones above 100 carats, of which there is a long list of famous examples, but the largest gem grade synthetic is still around 30 carats I believe. Vivid colors top out at much lighter than that. I guess we'll be able to outdo nature within a few decades though (as far as terrestrial diamonds go, anyway -- I seem to recall reading somewhere about the discovery of moon-sized space diamonds).
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