Mothae Diamond Fetches $37K/ct.

RAPAPORT… Lucapa Diamond Company garnered $3.8 million from the sale
of rough stones from its Mothae mine in Lesotho, with one stone going for $36,664 per carat.



The miner sold 5,411 carats at tender in Antwerp, its first commercial
sale of diamonds from the deposit. It recovered the stones in the fourth
quarter of 2018, during the plant’s ramp-up phase and in the first month of
commercial mining in January, the miner said Wednesday. Lucapa achieved an
overall average price of $707 per carat at the sale.


“The solid bidding we witnessed in Antwerp for this first
commercial parcel has certainly marked Mothae’s arrival on the international
scene as a producer of top-quality goods, complementing those from our Lulo
mine,” Lucapa CEO Stephen Wetherall said.


The company plans to focus its attention on progressing
exploration at Mothae and at its Lulo mine in Angola to maximize shareholder
value, it said. It will prioritize those projects over the Brooking deposit in
Australia and its Orapa site in Botswana.


Lucapa will publish the 2019 forecast for Mothae in the
second quarter, after it reviews the results of its first quarter of commercial
mining operations, it said.


Image: Diamonds sold at the Mothae tender in Antwerp. (Lucapa Diamond Company)