April 28 (UPI) — A 15-carat blue diamond present in South Africa final yr — the biggest diamond of that shade ever put up for public sale — has offered for near $60 million, blowing previous even the top-end estimates for the gem.
Sotheby’s in Hong Kong stated that the De Beers Cullinan Blue diamond offered to an nameless purchaser over the phone on Wednesday for $57.47 million.
The sale featured a bidding warfare between two patrons that lasted for eight minutes earlier than the ultimate hammer got here down.
Earlier than the public sale, Sotheby’s estimated that the step-cut gem might fetch as a lot as $48 million. The ultimate value was roughly $10 million increased.
Blue diamonds are among the many rarest of all coloured diamonds. The blue hue is often brought on by small quantities of boron throughout the crystal construction. File Photograph by John Angelillo/UPI
The Cullinan Blue gemstone is the biggest internally flawless vivid blue diamond that the Gemological Institute of America has ever graded, the auctioneer stated. The GIA says it is given its prime shade grading — “fancy vivid blue” — to not more than 1% of blue diamonds it evaluates.
The stone was minimize from an distinctive tough stone mined in South Africa a yr in the past.
Sotheby’s says that blue diamonds with the scale and high quality of the De Beers diamond are “exceptionally uncommon.” Solely 5 different diamonds bigger than 10 carats ever have come to public sale and none exceeded 15 carats. The De Beers stone is 15.10 carats.
The De Beers stone barely missed setting a gross sales report for blue diamonds. The record-holder is the 14.62-carat Oppenheimer Blue diamond, which offered for $57.5 million six years in the past.
Blue diamonds are among the many rarest of all coloured diamonds. The blue hue is often brought on by small quantities of boron throughout the crystal construction. This differs totally from pink diamonds, which get their shade from distortions throughout the lattice construction. Diamonds can exhibit numerous colours — together with orange, yellow, inexperienced and brown — and most get their shade from small quantities of chemical compounds inside.
