How does the supply of gemstones and rough actually work?
There seems to be a lot of confusion on how things actually work. Gemstone supply is a fairly complicated process as you may have guessed. Here is my experience on how it works and my opinions. The first thing that is important to know is that the supply of almost all gemstone rough is a long process that involves a lot of people all along the way. There is not really any one direct “source” or supplier of colored gemstones or rough. With the very rare exception of a few types of stones. Even in most of these very rare instances (where someone has the majority of the supply), there is more than one source or person with the same types and quality of stones usually. There is a lot of different ways the gemstone rough (cut too) supply gets to the market. About the only gemstone that is really controlled is Diamonds, and frankly that may not last with all of the new diamonds finds being developed all over the world. But here is how it generally goes with almost all colored gemstones in my
