Cheap platinum means cheap platinum rings, right?
So you might have noticed that the platinum spot price is only around 15% more than gold at the moment, so does that mean the buyer is entitled to a cheaper ring setting? The price of platinum bombed in mind-2008 from around US$2,000 an ounce and is currently hovering around US$1,100 - that’s a 45% drop!
To compound this, around June last year the Australian Dollar was almost at parity with the US Dollar, so you’d be right in expecting a saving of 60%, right? Well, the reality is I doubt most jewellers crunched the numbers quickly enough and even fewer would have passed on the savings as they were holding old stock bought a while back.
Anyway, none of that really mattered because come October 2008 the AUD fell back below 0.70 and hasn’t really been north of it since. Add the increased pressure of slower sales for jewellers and you would be lucky not to get a price increase at the moment!