This content was first published on IGR – Italian Gemological Review no. 4 in 2018. The information provided here is therefore current as of the original publication date.
Mustang Resources, the Australian mining company trading raw rubies coming from various locations in Mozambique, changes strategy. The field concessions in Montepuez, near those of Gemfields, are in a prospection phase with results that can make us predict a strong acceleration of productions. The mining group has opened an office dedicated to the direct sale of raw items in Thailand in Chantabury, the most important district for the working of corundums. It is a brisk change of direction that introduced in the core of a dynamic market the commercial focus of the company, following the far from brilliant results obtained in the sales of Mauritius at the end of 2017. However, in that case, they tried, may be with too much ambition, to auction big batches, while now they are distributing the raw material based on the market demands. It seems that the new policy better meets the needs to interpret the real demand of material, in particular the low quality one. Sales in the month of March reached peaks of over 18,000 carats, for a total of more than 230,000 dollars, mainly due to raw items of a not excellent quality. We are left to see how the traceability card, so interesting from many international brands, will be used and valorised in this new type of local distribution based on small batches.
Gem News by Trasparenze News, published on IGR – Italian Gemological Review #4, Summer 2018.
