The David Gleason Column
What is really happening in the argument between De Beers and the recently appointed government diamond valuator (GDV), run by Belgian Claude Nobels?
Well, part of the problem has been resolved – enough of it at any rate to enable De Beers to have shipped abroad around 70% of its stockpile of South African rough accumulated since the crisis began. The argument with the GDV revolves now around how to value the balance – is it to be priced at the values used by the Central Selling Organisation (CSO) in its price book or is the market price to diamantaires to be applied instead?
My information is that negotiations, which have been pretty torrid anyway, have now entered an unusually stressful period. De Beers – apparently – is on the verge of asking that certain provisions in the governing Act should now be applied. These are that the Diamond Board is to nominate five foreign buyers to bid for the balance of the stockpile so as to establish a price.
There are strings attached to this. The most significant is that De Beers wants the stock to be sold as a single batch, no cherry- picking thank you – and, since the value is reputed to be somewhere between $70-million and $80-million, that’s a pretty tall order.
This is especially so given the condition of the world diamond market. The last sight conducted by De Beers (July 12) fetched about $600-million – apparently the biggest July sight in the CSO’s history. What makes this especially interesting is that, traditionally, the July sight is usually the second smallest of the year. This year’s exceptional size is attributed to nervousness about the ongoing contretemps between De Beers and the GDV.
And that, in turn, implies that, having absorbed so much, buyers may now be stuffed full of rough. That will make any potential buyer of $70-million worth think twice. So, as an exercise in diamond evaluation, this may turn out to be a damp squib.
There are some quirks in this tale. The Diamond Board receives a fee of 0,155% of the value of diamonds leaving South Africa. An export duty can be levied on the balance (from which De Beers is exempt anyway). If it is found that the value placed by De Beers on these exports is understated by more than 20% then the board can impose a penalty of 20% on the difference.
You can bet your bottom dollar, though, that the matter of which value is applied would be the subject of protracted legal argument. I’m not certain the penalty would survive long.
While I’m on diamonds, try this tale. Once upon a time, in a country far, far away, a collection of five diamondiferous pipes tucked away in the Arctic Circle excited the world’s giant diamond mining and trading company, De Beers, so much that it stuck its hand in its corporate pocket and forked out $25-million (R153-million) for a stake.
Now there’s nothing new in this. But Russia is a country still trying to come to terms with its sudden arrival in the 20th century; capitalism presents an entirely new spectrum of opportunity; free enterprise is interpreted literally. It’s not for nothing that, barely eight unrewarding years since its command economy stopped dead, Russia is considered by many in the West to be a place which has elevated diversions of cash into purposes quite unintended to an art form.
On top of it all, De Beers has had a hard time of it wrestling with the Russian bear. It has had to put up with all manner of irritations, mostly Ivan’s endless ability to drive large holes through agreements intended to protect the world diamond industry from the marketing instability which is the stuff of its nightmares.
The Lomonosov pipes, about 100km from the northern port of Archangel, deep in very cold territory, are clearly sufficiently economic for De Beers to want to play a large part in how they’re to be exploited. It entered into arrangements with two Russian companies, Severalmaz and Soglasyie, which gave it an effective majority stake in how the Lomonosov deposit is to be worked (though Russian company law may not quite confer the same protection De Beers is accustomed to elsewhere).
That isn’t the issue, however. What’s of consuming interest is that Russian journalists are now breathing tales of how the $25-million has been disbursed. It is being whispered that both Severalmaz and Soglasyie are linked somehow with the Kremlin (meaning that senior Russian politicians and bureaucrats are involved) and that one Pavel Borodin, who reputedly looks after President Boris Yeltsin’s property portfolio, is intimately involved.
Another beneficiary is said to be a Mr Abramian, an Armenian who played a significant part in structuring the deal. What is even more intriguing is that it is also rumoured that yet another recipient of this largesse is more closely associated with De Beers itself.
Perhaps De Beers doesn’t mind where the money it paid goes now that it has cemented the deal it wanted. Personally, I’d be more than a bit miffed to discover that someone closely related is benefiting unreasonably (if, that is, the tale is true).