RAPAPORT... Swiss watch exports continued to decline in September, with China the only country to see an improvement.Total shipments fell 12% year on year to CHF 1.6 billion ($1.77 billion), the seventh consecutive monthly decrease. Although the decline was softer than in previous months, the market is still heavily reliant on Chinese orders, the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry reported Tue...Read More

RAPAPORT... Patrick Merrin has stepped down as interim CEO of Dominion Diamond Mines, deeming it "appropriate" to focus on his position at the rough producer's parent company.Merrin, who is chief operating officer at the Washington Companies, took on the lead role at Dominion when Shane Durgin left in February. The miner's full executive team will run the company temporarily until a solution is fo...Read More

RAPAPORT... The Plumb Club, an alliance of jewelry suppliers, has launched a collaboration with New York's Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) to help design students enter the industry.The project connects students in FIT's jewelry-design program with Plumb Club members, offering them mentoring, internships and exposure to potential employers, the trade organization said Monday. Students w...Read More

RAPAPORT... Petra Diamonds has called off its formal sales process, as its lenders have acquired majority ownership in the company in exchange for writing off sizeable debts.The groups reached the agreement following discussions on a long-term restructuring plan for the company that would allow it to pay back the $650 million in secured debt it currently owes, Petra said Tuesday. The miner had bee...Read More

RAPAPORT... WD Lab Grown Diamonds has hired heads of marketing, merchandise and operations as the US-based producer expands under private-equity ownership.Brittany Lewis joined WD earlier this year to lead marketing and merchandising, the company said last week. Her background is in branding, marketing and digital transformation for startups.Meanwhile, Caleb Wood has come on board as chief op...Read More

London Metal Exchange three-month base metals prices except aluminium were trading up at the close on Tuesday October 20, buoyed by an upswing in United States equities markets. US stock markets opened higher today, bolstered by the looming deadline for a regional stimulus package to fight the fallout of Covid-19. So while talks in the US senate went down to the wire, LME buyers and sellers had th...Read More

(IDEX Online) - India's recovering diamond industry is reportedly running short of rough, as coronavirus restricts air travel.Demand is growing but after three voluntary trade embargoes at the peak of the pandemic, the country's collective $2.7bn inventory is "almost exhausted".Small and medium diamantaires in India can't get to South Africa or Belgium to physically inspect rough di...Read More

RAPAPORT... The coronavirus crisis has split US jewelers into haves and have nots, Jewelers Board of Trade (JBT) president Erich Jacobs told the Rapaport Diamond Podcast.Digital-savvy businesses have thrived while less advanced competitors - or those exposed to the tourist industry - have fallen by the wayside, he noted. This has led to many jewelry companies losing their strong credit rating...Read More

(IDEX Online) - Troubled Petra Diamonds has agreed a debt-for-equity restructuring deal with lenders, after failing to attract any buyers.The UK-listed miner, founded by Adonis Pouroulis in 1997, was facing $650m of debts in senior secured bonds and launched a formal sales process in June to sell the company either as a whole.Today Petra Diamonds Limited (PDL) announced a deal whereby debtholders...Read More

(IDEX Online) - Botswana, the world's top diamond-producing country by value, has officially entered recession as it battles coronavirus.One of the biggest factors was the Q2 collapse of diamond mining. Production in carats fell by 67 percent according the latest report by the government's Statistics Botswana.The country's real GDP for April to June plunged 24 per cent as the global...Read More

Marcus Garvey is the new head of metals and bulks commodity strategy at Macquarie, the Australian bank said on Monday October 19. Garvey replaces Tom Price, who had been in...Read More

The three-month aluminium price on the London Metal Exchange was subdued during morning trading on Tuesday October 20 following a fresh inflow of 17,625 tonnes and continued re-warranting in Port Klang, while nickel futures breached nearby resistance amid steady buying. The aluminium price was recently trading at $1,841 per tonne on Tuesday morning, falling from Monday's closing price of $1,853.50...Read More

China has announced its 13th batch of scrap metal import quotas for 2020, allowing considerably smaller volumes of copper and aluminium scrap to enter the country than in its previous round of quotas.The latest batch permits 5,980 tonnes of copper scrap to be imported into China, the China Solid Waste & Chemicals Management Bureau said on Monday October 19. This brings the total amount of copper s...Read More

Domestic hot-rolled coil prices in Northern Europe were largely unchanged on Tuesday October 20, but buyers expect producers to increase their official offers soon, sources told Fastmarkets. The offer prices will rise, they added, based on the combination of reduced availability and solid demand.Fastmarkets calculated its daily steel hot-rolled coil index, domestic, exw Northern Eur...Read More

Flat steel import prices in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia mostly edged down over the past week amid limited demand, sources said on Tuesday October 20.UAEOffer prices for hot-rolled coil from suppliers in India remained steady week on week at $525-535 per tonne cfr, with market participants putting the workable price for India-origin HRC at around $520-525 per tonne, althoug...Read More

Novolipietsk Steel (NLMK) - the largest steel producer in Russia - will start the rolling mill modernization at its Belgian subsidiary NLMK Clabecq, the company said on Tuesday October 20.A ?,?30 million ($35 million) plate rolling mill upgrade will include the installation of a new descaling system with two new descalers and the modernization of the four-stand finishing mill, NLMK said.Despite th...Read More

The domestic United Arab Emirates rebar price fell again on Tuesday October 20 after deals concluded at lower levels, while the import price weakened amid a lack of construction demand. Domestic rebar The country's biggest steel producer, Emirates Steel, continued to offer rebar at 1,936 dirhams ($527) per tonne ex-works for orders to be produced in October, stable since September 15. Fellow steel...Read More

China's hot-rolled coil prices weakened on Tuesday October 20 amid thinner trading, with some buyers in wait-and-see mode on expectations of price declines due to a slowdown in the release of further stimulus by the Chinese government. Domestic Eastern China (Shanghai): 3,880-3,900 yuan ($580-583) per tonne, widening downward by 10 yuan per tonne A Shanghai-based trader said he garnered fewer deal...Read More

Rebar and wire rod producers from the Commonwealth of Independent States were in no hurry to make concessions to customers amid a number of positive factors in the market last week, sources told Fastmarkets.Market participants cited higher raw materials costs, comparatively higher prices from Turkish wire rod suppliers and consistently strong domestic demand for finished long steel products in som...Read More

Turkish steel mills have steered clear of the deep-sea scrap market for a second day this week, with no new bookings heard on Tuesday October 20.The day before, the market reported two bookings which had came to light from the previous week, at slightly higher prices, but no further cargoes were booked on Monday.One market participant was hopeful that prices would inch higher following a...Read More