Botswana Diamonds finds octahedron in sample material at Orapa

The Zimbabwe Independent quotes finance minister Tendai Biti (pictured) on Friday as saying the reality of Zimbabwe's situation is that there is no connection between Zimbabwe’s income from diamonds, its output and international prices adding the country's resources are in danger of turning into curse rather than a blessing. Zimbabwe exported 716 958,50 carats from its alluvial diamond mines but only $103,9 million of diamond export shipments was accounted for in the first half of the year. The military seized control of the rich diamond fields in Chiadzwa in 2006 and most observers believe an international ban on these gems are being widely flouted.

Anglo American, one of the world's largest miners, today reported strong first half growth with operating profit ahead 40% to $6bn. Chief Executive Cynthia Carroll said that investments made during the downturn would stand them in good stead in the near-term future. "We believe that the fundamentals for the mining industry are very, very strong, and therefore the longer-term outlook is extremely positive." Image by shizhao

Despite a flurry of mergers and acquisitions and a robust IPO market reports out on Wednesday suggest that fear is slowly replacing greed in the mining finance business. The Financial Post reports for investment bankers, the low-hanging fruit is long gone and the biggest financings are now high-risk: gold juniors in Africa, coal in Colombia and an infamous Quebec lithium play that overstated its resource. Global Mining Finance's July round-up says untrustworthy financial and resource reporting, threats of new royalty regimes, "super-profit" and carbon taxes, political turmoil, strikes and government takeovers are worrying resource investors all around the world.

Zimbabwe’s diamond production reached 2.329 million carats in the first half of 2011 with the bulk coming from the controversial Marange fields, Finance Minister Tendai Biti reported to Parliament on Tuesday. The Treasury expects production to ramp up in the second half to reach 8.2 million carats for the full year, which would be slightly lower than the 8.435 million carats mined in 2010.

De Beers, the world's largest diamond producer, announced Tuesday that it will further expand its retail outlets in China, the Wall Street Journal reported.

In an interview with Moneyweb on Tuesday, De Beers Chief Commercial Officer said the company had experienced its best six months since it went private in a $19 billion deal with parent Anglo-American in 2001. Bruce Cleaver said the stellar results that saw net income tripling had been driven not only by "enormously strong" consumer demand in China, Hong Kong, Macau, India and the Gulf states but "surprisingly" strong growth in America, where sales had been anaemic over the last few years.

Diamond mining group De Beers said on Tuesday that "exceptional" sales had nearly tripled net earnings in the first half to £423 million ($694 million), up from £155 million ($255 million) in the first half of 2010. The world's top diamond producer said it had registered total sales of £2.4 billion ($3.9 billion) in the six months to June 30, up from £1.8 billion ($3.0 billion) the year before.

Nambia?s ministry of finance said that Nambia plans to raise its mining tax by 17% to boost revenue, but the hike will not apply to the diamond sector. As per report the ministry of finance wants the mining tax to be raised to 44% from 37.5%.

CDE have announced the addition of Pilot Crushtec to their global distributor network with responsibility for South Africaand sub-SaharanAfrica. Pilot Crushtec will promote the full range of CDE washing equipment including the Evowash sand washing plant, Prograde screens, M2500 mobile washing plant, Rotomax logwashers and Aquacycle thickeners.