Knight Frank Luxury Investment Index – Coloured Gemstones Special

The report focussed on the increasing value of coloured gemstones, seen to be outperforming the wider jewellery market and therefore increasingly popular with investors and collectors worldwide. The index series provides up-to-date data on investments of passion, such as whisky, cars, jewellery and others, tracking each over time.   Andrew Shirley, head of luxury research at Knight Frank, commented, “In this issue of our Luxury Investment Index, we take an in-depth look at the performance of coloured gemstones. The interesting story here is that coloured gemstones are outperforming the wider jewellery market with some significant sales taking place already in 2019.”   At Bonhams’ London sale at the end of April 2019, several coloured gemstone lots blew away their estimates. The top performer was a 17.43-carat Kashmir sapphire ring, formerly owned by a European noble family that fetched £723,063, far exceeding its £300,000 to £400,000 guide price.   The second highest performing lot was a diamond and sapphire transformable necklace by Spanish jeweller, Grassy. Dated to around 1935 and featuring a 34.59-carat Sri Lankan (no heat) sapphire, the necklace sold for £287,562 against its pre-sale estimate of £120,000 to £180,000.   Record prices per carat for rubies have been achieved with prices rising to US$1.2m in 2016, a threefold growth between 2006 and 2016.   Sean Gilbertson, CEO of Gemfields, commented, “The swing towards precious coloured gemstones is overwhelming. The past decade has seen the world record prices for an emerald and ruby surpass that of a colourless diamond on a per carat basis. It surely can’t be long before sapphires overtake diamonds, too.   “We expect vibrant consumer interest and sector growth to continue. Responsible sourcing will receive ever-increasing attention and become progressively more important to consumers, making gemstone provenance perhaps the key driving factor.”   Gemfields and other industry experts contributed new data and insights to the report.