De Beers

The De Beers Group is a Johannesburg- and London-based diamond mining and trading corporation. It has historically held a near-total monopoly in the diamond trade, although recent Israeli interests have captured 20% of the market. In 1994 De Beers was charged by the United States Justice Department with antitrust violations for conspiring to fix prices for industrial diamonds. On 14 July 2004 De Beers pleaded guilty to the charges and paid a $10 million fine. The plea has enabled De Beers to trade directly in the United States diamond market after years of acting through intermediaries. The US diamond market is the largest in the world, purchasing approximately $500 million in industrial stones and $60 billion in diamond jewelry annually.

External links

• De Beers official homepage
• Official homepage of the De Beers/LMVH retail joint venture
• Yahoo! - De Beers Centenary AG Company Profile
• Yahoo! - De Beers Consolidated Mines Limited Company Profile
• History of the deBeers company

U.S. court case links

• De Beers settles (17th July 2004) from BBC News
• De Beers plans to settle (10th July 2004) from The Age
• De Beers plans to settle (10th July 2004) from the Washington Times
• The Times (London) 8 Feb 2004 article on recent developments.
• Mail on Sunday (UK) 20 April 2004 article on history of USA indictment.