ALROSA announcing its production and preliminary trading update today,   said its rough diamond production for 2016 totalled 37.4 million carats --  a decrease of  2% year-on-year. This, the Company said was “a result of a downward revision in production plans for the alluvial deposits in Q2 and Q3 2016, which is in line with the diamond market environment after 2015.”

However, production for Q4 2016 at 9.5 million carats as compared to 8.6 million carats in Q4  2015, was 10% higher y-o-y.   Alrosa said  the increase was  “driven by ramping up diamond mining at ALROSA’s underground mines and also by the fact that the Mir underground mine had reached its project capacity”.

The Aikhal Division saw a 1%  drop in production: 12.288 million carats produced in 2016 versus 12.322 million carats produced in the previous year.

 Mirny Division’s production rose by 13% to 7.808 million carats in 2016, as compared to 6.908 million carats recovered in 2015.

The Udachny Division saw a sharp fall of 26%,  producing 3.167 million carats in 2016 as against 4.297 million carats produced in the previous year. 

The Nyurba Division produced 6.793 million carats, which represented a drop of 10% compared to the previous year’s production of 7.510 million carats.

Lomonosov Division (Severlmaz) witnessed a growth of 14%, with production going up to 2.217 million carats in 2016 from 1.950 million carats in 2015.

Almazy Anabara produced 3.421 million carats in 2016, a hike of 3% over the 2015 production of 3.209 million carats.

Nizhne Lenskoye’s production fell  by  12% in 2016 to 1.724 million carats over 2015 production of 1.964 million carats.

ALROSA, putting out its preliminary  sales update said in 2016 it sold   40.1 million carats of diamonds. “Revenue from rough diamond sales is set to reach at least US$ 4.3 billion,” the Company reported.

ALROSA sold 10.1 million carats of diamonds in Q4 2016: this included    6.6 million carats of gem-quality diamonds at an average price of US$ 127 per carat; and 3.5 million carats of industrial diamonds at an average price of US$ 6 per carat. “Revenue from rough diamond sales amounted to at least US$  849 million in Q4 2016,” the Company revealed.