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by Will Purcell

The diamond and specialty minerals stocks box score on Friday was a mediocre 69-78-163 as the TSX Venture Exchange added two points to 603. The rough diamond price stalemate drags on. Paul Zimnisky's global rough diamond price index edged 0.1 point higher this week, although late-to-arrive data suppressed the past few weeks' settings below where they had previously been set. And so, while the index is slightly higher than a week ago, it is 0.5 point lower than where it had been set last week. Nevertheless, the current flattish trend has now persisted for 13 weeks -- three months -- and prices are 0.7 point higher than the multiyear low of 135.6 points set in early September.

At this point, even a flatlined chart offers rays of hope. Remember that Mr. Zimnisky's chart stood at 172.5 points a decade ago, and since then costs have risen about 30 per cent while rough diamond prices have fallen 21 per cent. That 51-percentage-point adverse swing was not what miners and analysts had in mind when the former rolled out -- and the latter applauded -- feasibility studies and dream sheets predicated on rough prices outstripping inflation by about 2 per cent annually for decades to come.

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