De Beers has dramatically reduced its roster of handpicked diamond buyers, known as sightholders, from approximately 70 to between 45 and 50. This move, communicated to customers on Friday (March 20, 2026), is one of the deepest cuts ever made to this elite group, reflecting the company's efforts to grapple with a severe and prolonged crisis impacting the diamond industry.
In addition to the reduced buyer list, De Beers has implemented deep price cuts on rough diamonds. While the exact size of the reductions is unclear due to changes in billing and diamond box composition, industry sources indicate that prices have been significantly lowered. This follows an earlier price cut in January 2026, the company's first official reduction in over a year, aimed at addressing slumping demand and an unsustainable strategy of privately selling discounted stones while maintaining higher official prices.
The diamond industry is facing one of its most challenging periods in modern history. Key contributing factors include a pullback in luxury spending from China, which was once a critical growth engine; the rising popularity and plummeting prices of lab-grown diamonds, which have taken significant market share, especially in the bridal segment; and U.S. tariffs on Indian diamond exports, which led to a sharp decline in shipments. For example, natural 1-carat diamonds fell to about $4,200 in 2025 from approximately $6,000 in 2021, according to BriteCo, while lab-grown 1-carat diamonds averaged $750-$1,000 in 2026, a 74% drop from 2020 prices.
De Beers' parent company, Anglo American, reported a $2.3 billion pre-tax impairment on its De Beers unit in 2025 and a total of $6.8 billion in writedowns over three years related to De Beers, leading to a $3.7 billion net loss for Anglo American in 2025. De Beers itself saw its EBITDA loss widen to $511 million in 2025 from $25 million the prior year. Rough diamond production fell 12% to 21.7 million carats as the company scaled back output. These financial struggles highlight the profound impact of market shifts, including the acknowledged "structural bifurcation" and "greater shifting of customer preference between natural diamonds and laboratory-grown diamonds", on the 137-year-old miner. Anglo American is now actively attempting to sell De Beers.
