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Lesedi la Rona diamond could fetch $90M

Thursday, 05 May 2016 7:35 AM [ Last Update: Thursday, 05 May 2016 7:35 AM ]

"Lesedi la Rona," a 1,109-carat rough diamond, is seen on display at Sotheby's New York.

A famous London auctioneer says a diamond the size of a tennis ball that is the largest discovered in more than a century could sell for more than 90 million dollars.

Sotheby’s chairman says it will offer the “Lesedi la Rona” diamond in London on June 29. The three-billion-year-old diamond was unearthed in November in Botswana at a mine owned by a Canadian company. It weighs 1,109 carats, the second-largest gem-quality rough diamond ever discovered.

The “Lesedi-la-Rona” is currently on a world tour ahead of an auction in London this summer. The auctioneer says the rough gemstone could yield the largest top-quality diamond ever cut and polished.

David Bennett, chairman of Sotheby's jewelry division, called the discovery "the find of a lifetime" and the auction unprecedented.

"Not only is the rough superlative in size and quality, but no rough even remotely of this scale has ever been offered before at public auction," he said.

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