De Beers Makes Sweeping Cuts to Its Elite Diamond-Buying Club

De Beers has made one of the deepest ever cuts to its group of handpicked diamond buyers as the former monopoly grapples with a prolonged crisis roiling the industry, people with knowledge of the matter said.

The company informed its customers, known as sightholders, on Friday whether they’d kept that status in a series of letters and follow-up calls, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing confidential information. De Beers cut the number of buyers to between 45 and 50 from around 70, they said.