Moscow: ALROSA reported a 12.5-percent decline on the year in rough diamond sales in value terms in the first four months of this year to $1.7 billion.
In volume terms, the firm sold 16.9 million carats of rough and polished diamonds, a rise of 7 percent on January-April 2016.
Meanwhile, in April, its rough diamond sales came to $310.2 million, while polished diamond sales for the month were $7.6 million.
"The decline in sales in value terms compared to the same period last year is primarily caused by a high base of the first months of 2016, when the market started to recover from a challenging 2015 and a lot of expensive diamonds were sold from previously accumulated stocks,” said ALROSA Vice President Yury Okoemov.
“The sales assortment structure has changed dramatically – in the first four months of 2017 the share of small-size, inexpensive rough diamonds was significantly higher than early in 2016. In general, this period can be described as a period of active restocking in the midstream against emerging recovery of growth in Chinese jewellery retail sales.”
