The company behind diamond “coins” for investors will embark on the automated purchase of about 50,000 gems on Tuesday.
The coins will be the world’s first regulator-approved, exchange-traded, fungible diamond commodity offering.
New York-based Diamond Standard is buying inventory to produce the first batch of 5,000 diamond standard coins, each containing “a set of certified natural diamonds with identical geological scarcity” weighing around 4.5 carats all with the exact value of $5,000.
The diamonds will be assembled into clear plastic coins containing a wireless blockchain token by the International Gemological Institute (IGI).
They will then be traded as a commodity and the price will fluctuate. Subsequent coins will replicate the rarity of the benchmark set.
“We buy sight unseen,” said CEO and founder Cormac Kinney. “Our computer automatically buys the least expensive diamonds across a statistically valid sample.
We don’t even know the price. We are literally buying the certificate.”
Diamond Standard bids electronically through its own Diamond Standard Exchange to buy a statistical samples of all qualities of natural, polished diamonds, seeking the lowest price across a wide range – D to L color, IF to SI2 clarity, VG to EX GIA cut scale, from 0.21-carats to 0.75-carats.
Source: IDEX