ALT/FNDATA · Market Analysis
Why White Diamonds Are Losing the Top of the Jewelry Market
The four most expensive jewels of H1 2026 in our record are a $25.6 million jadeite necklace and three colored diamonds. Beneath the trophies, white diamonds' share of million-dollar jewelry value has nearly halved since 2019, and the hottest bidding in the room is for sapphires, rubies and emeralds.
When a jadeite and colored diamond necklace made $25.6 million in Hong Kong this May, and the Ocean Dream colored diamond $17.4 million a week earlier, the season's message was already legible. Read across 1.8 million jewelry and gemstone results, the top of the market has quietly changed its stone: white diamonds took 24.2 percent of million-dollar jewelry value in 2019 to 2021 and 14.2 percent since 2024, while colored stones hold two thirds and beat their estimates at rates the white stone has never seen. This is the colored-stone bid, measured.
The headline
The correction in three numbers
14.2%
White diamonds' share of million-dollar jewelry value, 2024 to H1 2026
Down from 24.2 percent in 2019 to 2021, with million-dollar white-diamond lots falling from 76 to 43 while the market's total top-tier value held. The share nearly halved.
75%
Million-dollar sapphire, ruby and emerald lots beating their high estimate
Up from 49 percent in 2019 to 2021, the strongest estimate performance of any major family. The competition at the top of the room is for color.
$25.6M
The jadeite necklace, H1's top jewel
A magnificent jadeite bead and colored diamond necklace at Christie's Hong Kong in May, the second-highest jadeite result in our record behind the $27.6 million Hutton-Mdivani necklace of 2014.
The colored-stone shift at the top of the jewelry market, measured across 1.8 million realized results. · 10M+ auction results · 100+ houses.
The read
What the data shows
The stone mix at the top of the market is portfolio information. A dealer or collector holding important white diamonds is holding the one major family whose share of top-tier value nearly halved in five years; a buyer chasing sapphires, rubies and emeralds is bidding into the family that beats its own estimates three times in four. Estimates, insurance values and lending marks all key off which stones the top bid actually wants, and the realized-price record says it wants color.
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- The family table: share of million-dollar jewelry value by stone, 2019-2021 against 2024-H1 2026
- The heat map: which stones beat their estimates, and which are priced for perfection
- The Hong Kong bid: the $25.6M jadeite and the Paraiba run, one sale apart
- What the stone shift means for dealers, collectors and insurers
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