just wait till the millenials start marrying. and there is a resurgence in marriage. it is all just waves and cycles. all you need is one pop singer to bring piercings back and off we go.

> However, the article makes a good point. All the millennials I know care a lot more about their phones than their rings and earrings.

Which is a little funny, since after the initial drop in value I bet a decent jewel beats a phone after, say, 4 years.

That's a tough call. Jewels generally lose at least half their value the minute you buy them.

> "Because of the steep markup on diamonds, individuals who buy retail and in effect sell wholesale often suffer enormous losses. For example, Brod estimates that a half-carat diamond ring, which might cost $2,000 at a retail jewelry store, could be sold for only $600 at Empire."

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have-you...

Do you have a statistic for non-diamond jewels?

Rubies:

> The price you can get for your ruby depends on its quality characteristics, but there is one thing you should remember: It is unlikely that you will be able to sell a ruby gemstone for an amount that is even close to its retail price, especially if you are selling to jewelry stores. In fact, depending on who buys your stone, you may even get less than 50% of what you bought the ruby for.

Source: http://www.jewelrynotes.com/how-can-you-sell-your-ruby-jewel...

Other gems in general:

> Jewelers often sell stones for 2-3 (or more!) times their cost, but they are unlikely to buy stones from the general public for more than half their normal wholesale cost (i.e., they may buy a stone at a regular wholesale cost of $100, sell it at retail for $200-300, but only buy it back from an individual for $50)

Source: http://www.tradeshop.com/gems/invest.html

Have you ever tried to sell a used diamond? :)

Their value drops precipitously. Probably not quite as bad as an iPhone, but pretty close.

How can a diamond be "used" anyway? The way I think of it, you have wholesale and retail markets, which I completely understand (profit through information asymmetry) but is there really something stopping the same diamond from being sold wholesale and retail dozens of times as long as it's not damaged?

> is there really something stopping the same diamond from being sold wholesale and retail dozens of times as long as it's not damaged?

Yes. Tradition. You just don't sell diamonds, period. It's completely arbitrary - that's why it took DeBeers decades to firmly establish it within society in the past century. See the 1982 article every other poster links to.

If buyers had a choice of the same stone at a much lower price, they would take it. It sounds like a massive arbitrage opportunity.

Where can one buy used diamonds? I don't imagine they suffer much wear, and they're millions of years old already.

I assume you'd get them in a pawn shop, still set in whatever they were set in when they were pawned.

That's retail diamond though.

There is a price list index for wholesale stones

http://www.idexonline.com/Diamond_Index_Drivers.asp

But not over a decade or so. My old iPhone4 is probably worth (percentage wise) the same as a diamond purchased at the same time. But an iPhone2? My iPhone4 in the year 2020?

I don't think it's funny at all. They're not attached to it because of its monetary value, but rather its functional value.

Who cares what it's worth in 4 years?