ODC sales rise 9% to P3.1 bn
Brian Benza | Friday July 14, 2017 16:20
ODC deputy managing director, Marcus ter Haar told Mmegi BusinessWeek that the company held five auctions since January in which 1.8 million carats of diamonds were sold.
The volumes of carats sold were marginally higher (three percent) than the same period in 2016.
However, ter Haar did not provide the sales’ average price per carat saying it would be difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a comparison of average selling prices over different production periods.
“The average price per carat achieved at a sale will depend upon not only the prevailing market conditions but also the particular profile of the production being sold, which will vary month to month,” he said.
ODC, which will hold 10 tenders in 2017, sells 15% of Debswana’s production through auctions as Botswana seeks to develop its own price book through the independent window outside of De Beers’ channels.
Debswana targets to produce 20.5 million carats this year.
ODC buys partially sorted diamonds from De Beers Global Sightholder Sales (DGSS) and then sorts the goods into its own sales assortment before inviting its customers to view and purchase the stones through an auction process.
ter Haar also said ODC was in the process of piloting term contract sales in additions to their regular auctions.
“ODC are in the process of running a pilot for term Auctions. We recently hosted our second Term Auction offering a select number of assortments for supply over a three cycle period commencing in July,” he said.
A term auction allows customers to lock in a long-term supply commitment at prices indexed to future Spot auctions.
ODC’s customer registrations have grown incrementally each year and the company now enjoys a registered customer base of over 450 local and international companies.
ODC has contributed to the successful establishment of Botswana as a leading rough trading centre, attracting in excess of 100 international companies to each of its ten sales a year.
“Through its online auction platform, ODC is able to achieve market prices for its production and fulfil its mandate of providing government with ongoing market intelligence to support strategic decision making.
“Having established itself as a market leading rough trading organisation, the company is now well positioned for growth,” Minister of Minerals Resources, Green Technology and Energy Security, Sadique Kebonang said recently.