The multi-billion rand South African company nobody wanted to buy

Anglo American is yet to conclude the sale of its majority stake in De Beers, nearly two years after announcing plans to dispose of the iconic company as part of its plan to create Anglo 2.0. 

The sale of De Beers has been hampered by declining diamond prices as manmade alternatives surge in popularity and continue to take market share. 

These diamonds are incredibly similar to naturally mined gems but are significantly cheaper, making them attractive for some jewellers and particularly for industrial users of diamonds. 

This has left Anglo in a difficult position, with it unlikely to monetise the asset as it proposed to shareholders as part of its restructuring. 

Anglo has written down the value of De Beers by billions of dollars over the past two years due to declining diamond sales and falling prices. Earlier in 2026, De Beers announced it would cut diamond prices again, repeating a cut in 2024, to try to boost demand. 

For the first time in over a century, De Beers has lost its stranglehold on diamond supply due to the rise of man-made alternatives. 

This has made the company an incredibly tough sell for Anglo, with little to no interest from other mining companies. 

The only two serious buyers to emerge are the Botswana government, which already owns 15% of De Beers, and Angola’s state-owned diamond producer. 

De Beers gets around 70% of its diamonds from Botswana, with Bloomberg reporting that the government still wants to take a controlling stake in the company despite warnings from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The IMF warned against the Botswana government’s proposed purchase in late 2025, saying the diamond market’s prolonged slump makes it a risky undertaking. 

However, President Duma Boko has reiterated Botswana’s plan to take control of De Beers. “We want to take a bigger share and become the real owners,” Bloomberg reported him as saying in December 2025. 

“Diamonds are not selling due to the process being used, and we have to overhaul it. That’s why we are saying these diamonds are ours and we want to control them.”

However, Botswana appears to face competition in its bid to control De Beers, with Angola’s Endiama offering to buy Anglo’s entire 85% stake in the company. 

Angola has surpassed Botswana as Africa’s largest diamond producer, giving it significant interest in acquiring De Beers to cement its position. 

Endiama has reportedly said it expects the Angolan government to reach an understanding with Botswana, with ministers from the countries saying they are completely aligned on a deal. 

Angola wants access to De Beers’ modern mining technology, which is likely to make operations in the country more efficient and profitable. 

Botswana has said it is open to collaboration regarding a deal with Angola to take control of De Beers. 

In addition to African governments, there are reports that investor groups led by former De Beers executives have shown interest in buying the company. 

De Beers goes from hero to zero

The situation De Beers finds itself in is a far cry from the juggernaut that was the crown jewel within the Anglo stable for a large part of the 20th century. 

Such a situation would have seemed unimaginable to the founder of Anglo American, Sir Ernest Oppenheimer and his son, Harry. 

Founded in 1917, Anglo was a company forged from the successive diamond and gold rushes in South Africa. This provided the base from which Harry would make Anglo a sprawling megacorporation. 

However, while De Beers benefited from being part of Anglo, its real power came from another entity altogether – the Centralised Selling Organisation (CSO).

The CSO was the Oppenheimers’ brainchild, with it providing the means through which De Beers would end up with a stake in every single pipe diamond mine in the world. 

In effect, the CSO ensured that De Beers and the Oppenheimers would have significant influence over the supply of diamonds around the world, giving them immense pricing leverage. 

This gave De Beers the ability to increase its prices in line with the rising cost of mining diamonds by artificially limiting supply. It appeared as though this would be the case forever. 

Under Harry’s leadership, De Beers would produce 21.4 million carats of diamonds and generate R1.7 billion in revenue annually from 1957 to 1982.

However, this would not last, as man-made diamonds, first made in 1954, gradually became increasingly popular among industrial diamond users. 

While the first man-made diamonds were low-quality and only garnered interest from industrial users, they have improved by leaps and bounds since the 1950s. 

Research from McKinsey & Co. shows that manmade diamonds are broadly seen as on par with mined alternatives and that customers have no issue buying them instead. 

As customers search for more affordable options, this trend is only likely to accelerate in the future. As lab-grown alternatives have seen demand surge, more expensive natural diamonds have seen their interest plummet. 

These factors are playing out in an environment of limited growth for natural diamond supply, other geopolitical tensions, and shifts in financing – creating a perfect storm for diamond miners.

The Oppenheimers no longer hold stakes in Anglo American or De Beers. Harry’s son, Nicky, led the family’s 2011 sale of its $5.1 billion holding in the diamond miner.

If it has its way, Anglo may no longer hold any shares in the diamond miner, as it undergoes the most extensive restructuring in its history to ward off a potential takeover.

De Beers is currently valued at around $4 billion, which is still a handsome sum, but this is only likely to fall further in future, putting pressure on Anglo to secure a sale. 

Anglo’s restructuring efforts, including the sale of De Beers, were spurred on by a takeover attempt from BHP in 2024. 

To avoid being snapped up, Anglo formulated its plan to create a modern mining giant based largely on copper mines in South America. 

As part of this plan, De Beers would be separated from Anglo, along with Anglo American Platinum and the company’s Australian coal mines. 

In effect, the Anglo eggs would be unscrambled to form a copper giant, which could prove extremely lucrative for investors.

This plan has already proven highly attractive to fellow miners, with Canadian giant Teck Resources set to merge with Anglo. 

Anglo and Teck have received approval from the Government of Canada for their merger, which will create a Canadian-headquartered mining giant.