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De Beers Group Sets Out Portfolio and Organisational Actions to Support Long-Term Value Creation

Company outlines strategic cost optimisation, portfolio streamlining and operational changes to strengthen resilience while positioning for long-term growth in the natural diamond industry.

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De Beers Group is advancing delivery of its business streamlining by setting out a number of planned portfolio and organisational changes to ensure an efficient cost base that strengthens resilience in the near-term while enhancing future competitiveness and retaining optionality as industry conditions improve.

Since 2024, De Beers has been streamlining its business in line with its Origins strategy to reduce costs, divest non-core assets and prioritise investment in activities that create the most value. Significant progress has been made, with more than $100 million of annual overhead costs removed from the business, the sale or closure of a number of non-core assets and significant capital and cost reconfigurations to asset expansion projects.

Simultaneously, De Beers has reinvested in natural diamond category marketing to support the industry’s efforts to grow natural diamond demand, launching new large-scale campaigns and collaborating with key stakeholders across the value chain to foster industry-wide investment. Global consumer demand for natural diamond jewellery returned to growth in 2025, while natural diamond sales increased across US independent jewellers in 2025 and into Q1 2026, led by higher value diamonds and those promoted by De Beers’ Desert Diamonds marketing campaign.

On the supply side, global rough diamond production is now decreasing, with several producers closing mines during 2026. Whilst the increasing rarity of diamonds and the emerging signs of improvement in consumer demand are likely to support longer-term value creation, rough diamond trading conditions are expected to remain challenging in the near-term due to cyclical and industry-specific factors.

Consistent with recent actions to improve business resilience, De Beers intends to pause production at the Venetia mine in South Africa for two years to reduce costs while also rephasing capital expenditure on its underground project. This will involve critical infrastructure investment to enhance the capacity and efficiency of the mine, with the intention to support future production growth as business and industry conditions improve.

De Beers is engaging with stakeholders in accordance with relevant requirements and the company’s values as it moves through this process, and will both support impacted employees and continue to invest in its community and Social and Labour Plan commitments.

This proposed action at Venetia Mine follows the decision earlier this year to pause the Tuzo Phase 3 expansion project at the Gahcho Kué Mine in Canada.

In parallel, De Beers plans to reconfigure its global operating model to refocus and prioritise resources on the core operational businesses and reduce its central corporate cost base.

Al Cook, CEO of De Beers Group, said:

“In line with our commitment to focus and streamline our business, we are making a number of changes to De Beers to ensure greater business resilience in the near-term, while supporting long-term value creation. We recognise the protracted challenging conditions as the diamond industry evolves, though we are encouraged by signs of consumer demand growth in the US and beyond, particularly in higher quality diamonds.

Global rough diamond supply is falling, bringing more support to the market. The changes we are making to our business are focused on underpinning our efficiency now and into the future, favourably positioning De Beers in its leadership role.”

De Beers Group will maintain current production levels through its other operations, and previous production guidance remains unchanged.

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DiamondBuzz

De Beers Sale Could Take 18 Months To Clear Regulatory Hurdles: Duncan Wanblad

The strategic divestment of De Beers highlights the persistent friction between corporate portfolio optimization and multi-jurisdictional regulatory compliance.

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The long-awaited sale of De Beers could easily take 18 months to clear regulatory hurdles, says Duncan Wanblad, CEO of parent company Anglo American, once a deal is finally agreed.

Wanblad has, however, insisted that the company is not exclusive with any consortium and that more than one group remains involved in the process.

The strategic divestment of De Beers by Anglo American highlights the persistent friction between corporate portfolio optimization and multi-jurisdictional regulatory compliance.

Initiated in May 2024 as part of a sweeping restructuring, Anglo’s decision to offload its loss-making diamond unit was designed to sharpen capital allocation around core, high-margin assets like copper and iron ore.

However, CEO Duncan Wanblad’s candid assessment underscores a critical transactional reality: securing a signed agreement is merely the precursor to a prolonged regulatory clearance phase.

While Anglo American maintains a target to agree on deal terms by the end of 2026, market expectations regarding transaction completion require re-calibration. Antitrust approvals across key diamond consumption and trading hubs—most notably the United States, China, and the European Union—could extend the execution window by up to 18 months post-signing.

Given De Beers’ historical market concentration and influence across global supply chains, international competition authorities will undoubtedly subject any structural change in ownership to intense scrutiny.

 Although the Global Diamond Consortium, spearheaded by former De Beers managing director Gareth Penny, has positioned itself as a primary contender, Anglo American has deliberately avoided granting exclusivity. While maintaining multiple bidding tracks preserves commercial leverage, it delays the precise regulatory preparation required for closing. Formal filings cannot be finalized until the specific jurisdictional footprint and capital background of the acquiring consortium are locked in.

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JewelBuzz is Asia’s First Digital Jewellery Media & India’s No.1 B2B Jewellery Magazine, published by AM Media House. Since 2016, we’ve been the trusted source for jewellery news, market trends, trade insights, exhibitions, podcasts, and brand stories, connecting jewellers, retailers, and industry professionals worldwide.

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