Anglo American halves De Beers’ value as the natural diamond slump deepens
The miner has now written down De Beers by roughly $6.8 billion over the past three years.
The gemstone giant that once sold the world on “A Diamond is Forever” just got its value slashed again.
On Friday, Anglo American announced a $2.3 billion impairment on its De Beers unit — the world’s largest diamond miner by value — in 2025, its third write-down in three years.
Rough patch
De Beers’ natural stone business has been losing its luster for some time, as China’s luxury slowdown has weighed on demand and cheaper, near-identical lab-grown diamonds have intensified competition, putting downward pressure on natural diamond prices. Excess supply of rough diamonds and US tariffs on India — where 90% of diamonds are cut and polished — have only added further strain.
To boost slowing sales volumes, De Beers offered bulk discounts — but that cut into margins. Its billion-dollar profits vanished in 2023 and 2024, before turning into heavy losses last year as the company booked EBITDA of -$511 million in 2025.
Anglo American’s net loss came in at $3.7 billion for the year, driven largely by the De Beers impairment. Fortunately for the mining group, diamonds are no longer core. After fending off a ~$50 billion takeover bid from BHP Group in 2024, Anglo is pivoting away from diamonds and coal to copper and iron ore. In September, it agreed to merge with Canada’s Teck Resources to form a $53 billion copper giant, as the metal becomes more precious owing to its importance amid the EV and AI infrastructure booms.
Meanwhile, Anglo is pressing ahead with plans to sell De Beers, with potential buyers including African governments, notably Botswana (already a 15% shareholder) and Angola. CEO Duncan Wanblad said Friday that he’s “optimistic” a deal will be signed in 2026.
