Editor’s Note
This article highlights a significant bankruptcy in Antwerp’s diamond sector, underscoring the severe financial pressures facing the global diamond industry. The case reflects broader challenges of slowed trade and liquidity crises affecting key market hubs.
Surat: A firm dealing in rough and polished natural diamonds in Antwerp, which also acted as a private financier to a diamond trading firm, went bankrupt with liabilities of over $17 million earlier this month.
Unable to repay its debt due to a slowdown in diamond trading and manufacturing, the firm is facing bankruptcy. This is said to be a major development in the international diamond trading hub.
The firm is owned by a diamond businessman from Saurashtra and his wife. The businessman has been settled in Antwerp for over 30 years and established businesses in several countries.
In Diamond City, Diwali vacation has been announced for diamond cutting and polishing units. Leading units have announced that they will reopen in the second and third weeks of Nov, while a few smaller units are yet to announce when they will restart operations. Meanwhile, lab-grown diamond growing and polishing units are to start early.
Workers and units who have shifted to LGD polishing are compromising with earnings but are getting work. Industry insiders say the units and workers are continuing to work despite the sharp drop in earnings in LGD manufacturing to avoid becoming completely unemployed in the natural diamonds sector.