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Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1585, 31 October 1912, Page 10

Although the United States is still the greatest market for diamonds, there has been riurinc the past few years so serious a- falling oil in the demand in that quarter that the rest of the world, particularly Europe, has relatively been of greater importance *to producers than usual. But this year the United States has enlarged its purchases considerably, with the result that the price of diamonds, which bad sunk to a low ebb, ha* advanced considerably. One of the neenliar features of the diamond bu«-ine?s is the paucity and uncertainty of statistics. Af is fairly well known, the bulk of the trad? passes through the hands of,a Continental syndicate, which has a permanent the pro. during mines. Its archives, which are naturally not open-for inspection, contain, probably, the most complete niul accurate records in existence of the stocks, sales, and market fluctuations. In some respects the trade is an almost infallible index of the prosperity of the civilised world. Diamonds of all thing? a. luxury of luxuries, and when the industrial activity of any given community is on tbo upgrade, then, if ever, is the time when it is ready to buy diamonds.