Antwerp..

[dianabarbara]

I have read somewhere on this forum that consumers can buy diamonds at 65% of their Rapaport tag.

Is there any truth in this?

I live less than 2 hours away from Antwerp, been there several times visiting jewelry shops, and found their prices pretty normal.

d.

 

[denverappraiser]

Diamond prices are not a function of the address of the jeweler.

Diamond prices are only indirectly a function of Rap. (for those who don’t know what that is, it’s short for Rapaport Diamond Report, a magazine for the trade that includes pricing information. Info about them is at www.rapaport.com)

Can you buy diamonds at 65% of Rap? Sure. The database here is full of them. To be sure I’m not recommending for or against any of these particular stones but there’s a whole industry designed to sell based on discount from Rap. The trick is in the grading and the details not included in the Rap grid, especially cutting.

Diamonds are a worldwide market and have been for years. Decade actually. As a general rule, the lowest margin and most competitive dealers are the US internet folks but they can easily ship to you in Antwerp if you want. FedEx service is comparatively cheap and Belgian import taxes I think are zero (as are the US by the way). There is a definite advantage to buying from a jeweler who is close to home so if you can find a nearby dealer who can be price competitive, I would certainly consider them.

 

[Efriede]

Diamond prices are not a function of the address of the jeweler.

Diamond prices are only indirectly a function of Rap. (for those who don’t know what that is, it’s short for Rapaport Diamond Report, a magazine for the trade that includes pricing information. Info about them is at www.rapaport.com)

Can you buy diamonds at 65% of Rap? Sure. The database here is full of them. To be sure I’m not recommending for or against any of these particular stones but there’s a whole industry designed to sell based on discount from Rap. The trick is in the grading and the details not included in the Rap grid, especially cutting.

Diamonds are a worldwide market and have been for years. Decade actually. As a general rule, the lowest margin and most competitive dealers are the US internet folks but they can easily ship to you in Antwerp if you want. FedEx service is comparatively cheap and Belgian import taxes I think are zero (as are the US by the way). There is a definite advantage to buying from a jeweler who is close to home so if you can find a nearby dealer who can be price competitive, I would certainly consider them.

It is very interesting topic..hm..I also think that US internet market is the most competetive, and that is exactly due to absence of import taxes. So the vendors like WF or BGD have their stones cut in Antwerpen, bring them to USA and if they sell to Europe, Belgium for example, then VAT is 23%. .

 

[dianabarbara]

Hi devenappraiser,

thank you for your answer! It confirms my suspicions..

My problem with purchasing directly from a US-based online vendor is that, while it is true that there is no import duty on diamonds in Belgium, the 20% VAT still does make a big difference on the final price.
The most friendly diamond consumer place over here appears to be Switzerland, but there is still an 8% tax charged over the price.

What concerns me most is - what if I see the stone and I am not entirely satisfied?

Does it ever happen that customers ask a local store to import a diamond on their account from - say - James Allen or another online vendor - and only after seeing the stone commit to purchasing it?

Efriede.. I know! it's crazy!!

 

[dianabarbara]

interesting.

from Smille, Gberie, Ianzeton 'The heart of the matter: Sierra Leone, Diamonds, and Human Security'

 

[WinkHPD]

Any diamond that you could buy as a consumer at 65% of their Rap listing price would NOT be cut well enough to want. Both wholesalers and retailers are paying more than that for the best cuts.

That having been said, if you know enough about diamonds to grade your own stones for color and clarity and are willing to put your money on your knowledge, there are some good deals on unpapered diamonds in Antwerp.

Many of the diamonds that you will find in the bourse there are not papered.

Wink

 

[denverappraiser]

That having been said, if you know enough about diamonds to grade your own stones for color and clarity and are willing to put your money on your knowledge, there are some good deals on unpapered diamonds in Antwerp.

Wink

I disagree. One of the peculiar things that happen in the diamond business is that everybody has faith. I’ve long wanted to order the UFO poster from X-files that says ‘I want to believe’ because it’s so appropriate for diamond people. Sellers ‘want to believe’ it’s an H even though they know it’s not. Buyers ‘want to believe’ that the sellers missed something and they’re finding a great bargain because they’re got a copy of a copy of an old Rap sheet so they know the secret. It’s a standard appointment for me to have two people come in together looking to have a stone graded so they can make a deal. The seller has made a representation and the buyer is hoping it’s true. That hope clouds judgment. I get this job regularly from people who I KNOW to be expert graders themselves. The thing is, they know that if they make a big money decision based on their own expertise when they stand to make or save a bunch of money based on the results, their judgment, and their grading skills are affected. It’s human nature. It makes more sense to pay me when I have no pony in the race to make the call. It’s rather like the classic advice that a lawyer who represents himself in court has a fool for a client.

 

[denverappraiser]

Hi devenappraiser,

thank you for your answer! It confirms my suspicions..

My problem with purchasing directly from a US-based online vendor is that, while it is true that there is no import duty on diamonds in Belgium, the 20% VAT still does make a big difference on the final price.
The most friendly diamond consumer place over here appears to be Switzerland, but there is still an 8% tax charged over the price.

What concerns me most is - what if I see the stone and I am not entirely satisfied?

Does it ever happen that customers ask a local store to import a diamond on their account from - say - James Allen or another online vendor - and only after seeing the stone commit to purchasing it?

Efriede.. I know! it's crazy!!

I don't claim to be an expert on the VAT but my understanding is that you owe it whether you buy from a local vendor or import it yourself and that the rate is unchanged.

All of the Internet vendors that I'm aware of that I would seriously consider offer a return policy that's long enough for you to look at the stone and return it if you're not happy. A few, like Blue Nile, have operations in other countries that make the process a bit more seamless in that they take care of the customs clearance but the nature of the transaction is about the same. I can't imagine a dealer would want to buy from a competitive retailer but many can share the same sources and if there's a particular stone that interests you they may be able to get it. I would fully expect there to be a charge associated with bringing in a 'virtual' stone for inspection but exactly how much would be a matter of negotiation with them. Have you asked?

 

[WinkHPD]

deleted to restate with quote from Neil

 

[WinkHPD]

That having been said, if you know enough about diamonds to grade your own stones for color and clarity and are willing to put your money on your knowledge, there are some good deals on unpapered diamonds in Antwerp.

Wink

I disagree. One of the peculiar things that happen in the diamond business is that everybody has faith. I’ve long wanted to order the UFO poster from X-files that says ‘I want to believe’ because it’s so appropriated for diamond people. Sellers ‘want to believe’ it’s an H even though they know it’s not. Buyers ‘want to believe’ that the sellers missed something and they’re finding a great bargain because they’re got a copy of a copy of an old Rap sheet so they know the secret. It’s a standard appointment for me to have two people come in together looking to have a stone graded so they can make a deal. The seller has made a representation and the buyer is hoping it’s true. That hope clouds judgment. I get this job regularly from people who I KNOW to be expert graders themselves. The thing is, they know that if they make a big money decision based on their own expertise when they stand to make or save a bunch of money based on the results, their judgment, and their grading skills are affected. It’s human nature. It makes more sense to pay me when I have no pony in the race to make the call. It’s rather like the classic advice that a lawyer who represents himself in court has a fool for a client.

LOL! I have been on both sides of that.

One of the best deals I ever made in Antwerp was buying a parcel of ten 1 - 1.2 ct stones that I graded as H - I - J SI2-I1 stones. I figured wholesale in the States was about $1,800 at the time and I bought the entire parcel at $1,200. Sold it all in two weeks at $1,800. Horrible cutting and not Pricescope material but I could not pass it up at the price. No papers, but no one cared, they just wanted cheap stones that looked big. I saw my cousin's wife the other day, and she is still so happy with these big sparkly diamonds in her ears. They are pretty too, just not pretty like they could have been if they had been cut correctly and cost so much more because of the smaller diamonds they would have yielded.

One of the worst was a H&A G-VS that graded out G - VS but the H&A fooled me as the stone was at best an AGS 2 cut grade in spite of the H&A. Took me two years to sell it, which negated any price advantage I might have had by buying it, "at the cutters." It too was pretty, but I paid the price of a well cut stone as I did not have the advantage of all the tools that we have today such as the ASET and the idealscope. Just another lesson learned.

Mostly I saved a little money buying in Antwerp, and sold a lot of stones as I was now a diamond importer to my local clientele. A couple of years later I met Paul and now I don't need to go look for deals as I can no longer face selling anything that is not of top cutting quality. My continuing education made me too aware of what the average stone delivers versus what the best cuts deliver.

Honestly, it is amazing the difference that having to stay on my toes to work with Pricescopers has made in my life. It forced me to learn the minute nuances that make such a tremendous difference in appearance from diamond to diamond. It has greatly reduced the pool of "sellable" diamonds for me compared to my less picky competitors, but it sure does make working with the selection a LOT more interesting and rewarding.

Wink

 

[dianabarbara]

Hi Deven,

I have tried to find the best way to get an answer to this question. Out of luck, I managed to find exactly the same stone sold on one European based company website and a US based company website. The price over the European website was around 30% more than the US one. It includes taxes (21%) and still a high (I think) 9% margin on top of it.

I contacted the very kind sales manager of the European company asking whether they could match the price.
He will come back to me within a few days, he said.

Of course, this is just one particular company and one particular stone case, so very limited sample size. Still, interesting to see what will happen!

d.

 

[dianabarbara]

and another question for you and Wink:

can consumers access the diamond bourse, and how does it work?
and is it common to see non graded stones at the diamond bourse?

While browsing shops in Antwerp, I have noticed some offer stones that are graded 'in-house'. There are also some negative reviews on Tripadvisor referring to a few specific jewelries where apparently stones were graded inappropriately, as some customers found out later by having them independently appraised.

My understanding is that the European market is still much less invested by concerns in having stones independently graded, and also much less dominated by large scale internet retailers. Overall, I would say with some approximation that here standards are yet much less predominant, and the choice of a stone is more an act of 1) individual sensibility of the customer, and 2) trust of the customer towards the jeweler.

 

[denverappraiser]

No, consumers can't access the bourse, and you wouldn't want to even if you could. For starters there's a membership fee that's considerable. Secondly, there are minimum purchase requirements from the dealers, assuming they will sell to you at all, that are in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The US market is hardly dominated by the Internet houses. They have a decently high profile, especially around here, but they're less than 5% of the market combined. The biggest jeweler in the US is Walmart followed by the usual suspects like Home Shopping network, Zales and Sterling (the parent company of Jared's). The pure internet players don't even make the list.

http://www.nationaljeweler.com/nj/majors/a/~29055-National-Jewelers-State-of-the

It's correct that Independent Appraisers in Europe seem to be less popular than they are in the US.

 

[John P]

Hi all.

I remember this discussion from a couple of years back which delineates the actual Antwerp DD (Bourses, etc.) from the "frosting" district, where you can lose your shirt.

https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/belgium-antwerp-or-surrounds.156577/

 

[dianabarbara]

No, consumers can't access the bourse, and you wouldn't want to even if you could. For starters there's a membership fee that's considerable. Secondly, there are minimum purchase requirements from the dealers, assuming they will sell to you at all, that are in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The US market is hardly dominated by the Internet houses. They have a decently high profile, especially around here, but they're less than 5% of the market combined. The biggest jeweler in the US is Walmart followed by the usual suspects like Home Shopping network, Zales and Sterling (the parent company of Jared's). The pure internet players don't even make the list.

http://www.nationaljeweler.com/nj/majors/a/~29055-National-Jewelers-State-of-the

It's correct that Independent Appraisers in Europe seem to be less popular than they are in the US.

Hi Deven, thank you for the info! I suspect being frequently on PS I ended up with a very biased perception of what the diamond market in the US might look like

 

[dianabarbara]

Hi all.

I remember this discussion from a couple of years back which delineates the actual Antwerp DD (Bourses, etc.) from the "frosting" district, where you can lose your shirt.

https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/belgium-antwerp-or-surrounds.156577/

Hi John! thank you for the heads-up! the link you posted reports very useful information.

Clearly, I ended up in the 'frosting' area and had mixed experiences. One store we walked in (Geretti) had outstanding customer service. It was a very nice experience, they just did not have what we were looking for. In other shops, I had the impression that personnel was rather pushy, and not too inclined to share info (or maybe not knowledgeable enough?).

I will take a look at fortrez.

 

[Paul-Antwerp]

Reading the thread, I would like to clarify the tax-situation in Belgium. With Antwerp being the world's main trading-center for diamonds, we have some procedures here that sometimes benefit the trade, but could complicate the life of consumers.

Roughly speaking, there are two potential taxations, being an import-duty and the VAT.

For import duties on diamonds, Belgium is an island within the European Union, with no import duty. Given the enormous size of the various movements of diamonds in and out of Belgium, it is logical to have a 0%-duty here.

The normal VAT-rate on diamonds in Belgium is 21%. However, registered Belgian diamond companies are VAT-exempt, if they adhere to certain regulations, and transactions between such registered companies are also VAT-exempt. Again, looking at this from a macro-level, it is a logical measure.

On any sale to a private person or to a company, not registered as a diamond-company, VAT is due according to EU-regulations. Sales to a private individual (even from another EU-country) go with the Belgian VAT-rate of 21%. Sales to a company within Belgium also are with Belgian 21%-VAT. Sales to a company in another EU-country will go with the VAT-rate of the latter country.

For customers outside of the EU, there is no VAT, as long as actual export can be documented.

For people within the EU, importing diamonds into the EU, import duty and VAT of the country imported into will apply.

Live long,

 

[dianabarbara]

Hi Paul,

many thanks for these clarifications! What happens then if a European customer commissions the purchase of a stone to a US jeweler for having a setting made?
It sounds to me like the US jeweler would not need to pay any tax, and the VAT would be applied once the ring is re-imported in the EU once the stone is set.

Thank you for sharing your insights on this forum! This is great great info.

d.

edited for typos

 

[Paul-Antwerp]

Hello Dianabarbara,

If a diamond or a ring is bought outside of the EU, upon import, the following duties will apply:

- The import duty of the country imported into. Like I said, no duty on diamonds in Belgium, but possibly existing in other EU-countries. I am not sure if there is a Belgian import-duty on finished jewelry, as opposed to loose diamonds.
- The VAT-rate of the country imported into.

Re-reading your question, are you considering to buy the diamond in the EU, then getting it set outside of the EU. In theory, there is only duty and VAT on the setting, but the proof of the paperwork may become complicated. Also, do not forget shipping expenses and insurance.

Live long,

 

[dianabarbara]

Hi Paul,

thank you for clearing up ideas on this.

Also thank you to Deven and Wink. Sometimes as consumers we have no idea of the mechanisms behind the scenes, bu getting acquainted with tax issues might help saving up some extra (or investing all in a better stone!)