TL;DR
De Beers is using blockchain to defend natural diamonds against lab-grown rivals. GIA’s acquisition of a 30% stake in Tracr gives the provenance platform industry-wide credibility, but with diamond prices down sharply and lab-grown stones grabbing market share, technology alone may not justify the premium.
The natural diamond industry has a problem it cannot see with the naked eye. Lab-grown stones are now virtually identical to mined gems, they cost a fraction of the price, and the broader tech landscape of 2025 has only accelerated their rise.
De Beers Group, the world’s largest diamond producer and distributor, is betting that blockchain can provide what geology alone no longer does: proof that a stone is worth its price tag.
GIA buys into Tracr
The Gemological Institute of America (GIA) has agreed to acquire a 30% stake in Tracr, the De Beers-backed firm behind a blockchain platform that traces diamond origins. The deal, announced in June 2026, marks a significant step towards making Tracr an independent, industry-wide infrastructure.
De Beers has been developing Tracr since 2018. The platform has registered more than five million rough diamonds at their source, covering roughly two-thirds of De Beers’s rough diamond production by value.
Blockchain-based provenance tracking is not a new concept, but applying it at this scale in the diamond industry is.
“Consumers deserve to know where their diamonds come from and they should feel more confident in their understanding of each diamond’s source,” said Al Cook, CEO of De Beers. Cook joined De Beers in February 2023 from Norway’s Equinor, where he held an executive vice-president role.
A market under siege
The urgency behind Tracr’s expansion is clear from the numbers. The IDEX Diamond Price Index, a major global benchmark, peaked near 155 in 2022 and has since fallen sharply.
Year-on-year losses of 17.9% in 2023, 13.7% in 2024, and 10.9% in 2025 paint a bleak picture. The source article claims the index dropped from 158 to 86 over that period, a plunge of more than 45%.
Independent data confirms a peak near 155 and sustained multi-year declines, though the exact end-of-2025 level could not be independently pinpointed to 86. The direction and approximate magnitude of the crash are not in dispute.
Lab-grown diamonds are the driving force. In mainland Chinese stores, a 1-carat lab-grown diamond reportedly sells for around 3,500 yuan (US$518), less than one-tenth the price of a comparable natural stone.
Production is concentrated in China’s Henan province, which accounts for roughly 80% of the country’s lab-grown diamond output.
The 40% claim needs context
The source article, citing Chinese state broadcaster CCTV, states that lab-grown diamonds accounted for over 40% of sales in the global diamond jewellery market last year, an eightfold increase from 2019. Independent market data from Statista pegs the global lab-grown market share at roughly 21% in 2025, a significant gap from the 40% figure.
The discrepancy may reflect differences in how “sales” are measured, whether by volume, by number of pieces sold, or by revenue. It may also reflect a China-specific figure rather than a global one.
Readers should treat the 40% claim with caution until the underlying methodology is clarified.
Can blockchain justify the premium?
Lu Qi, an associate professor at the China University of Geosciences (Beijing), told the South China Morning Post that provenance tracking records each diamond’s origin, design, cutting, and polishing processes. Buyers can trace the entire journey, she said, which should boost consumer confidence.
Lu also noted that traceability may push up the cost of natural diamonds, an interesting dynamic in a market already haemorrhaging on price. The strategy mirrors Deloitte’s framework for viable blockchain use cases, which identifies supply chain transparency as one of the technology’s strongest enterprise applications.
A NielsenIQ survey conducted in China found that among 1,170 respondents, 95% planned to buy jewellery in the next 12 months and 70% preferred natural diamonds. Some 92% said they considered traceability highly important.
This survey data could not be independently verified against a separate source beyond the SCMP article and De Beers-associated press releases.
The bigger picture
De Beers’s blockchain bet is ultimately a branding exercise dressed in enterprise technology. Tracr does not make natural diamonds cheaper, nor does it make them visually distinguishable from lab-grown alternatives.
What it does is attach a verified story to every stone, turning provenance into a value proposition that blockchain is uniquely suited to deliver.
Whether that story is worth a tenfold price premium is a question consumers will answer with their wallets. For De Beers, the hope is that enough of them still believe a diamond’s origin matters more than its atoms.
Stephan is the sports journalist for the Maple Grove Report.
