Ann: Ellendale Diamond Project - Maiden Resource Lights Stockpile, page-16

Seems Russian ban very hard to govern. Tracing almost impossible from what I've heard and read (chemical tracing means very little as country or mine specific differences are so minute they need to crush and test thousands and thousands of diamonds to obtain a data set to reference against). Inscribing on the diamond can be done, but can just as easily be erased. Subsurface inscribing possible but costs are high and not feasible for perhaps most smaller sizes. Only way is origin of mine stuff but can likely be fudged?

A good start is the Rapaport diamond podcast.

Diamond prices are very much size relevant. 2+ct prices holding much much better and declines nowhere near 1ct. Clearly prices are well down but the media jump on the 1ct price vs all the other categories.

LGD market looks to be legit competition but likely for different reasons. People can experiment freely with LGD, unconventional and different designs can be cut as limited loss due to much lower prices. From what I can tell, Asian consumers are doing this and therefore they have a market to sell to.

I have a few questions re Ellendale. What is the capex to get it up and running? I'm guessing (only a very rough guess that is likely way off!) perhaps $8-10m? Do they have any equipment? How long will it take for equipment to be built/delivered? They say mining in 2024, but it seems like they have only looked at the permitting and price/ct?

Thanks