U.S. polished diamond imports rose 6 percent year on year to $1.7 billion in June, government data showed.
By volume, polished imports fell 5 percent to 737,302 carats and the average price increased 11 percent to $2,319 per carat, Rapaport news reported .
Polished exports decreased 9 percent to $2.7 billion and the volume of exports fell 7 percent to 2.021 million carats. As a result, the average price declined 2 percent to $1,322 per carat. June is traditionally a month with a large amount of exports from the U.S. as a lot of goods are returned to trading centers after the JCK Las Vegas show, which ended on June 2 this year .
U.S. net polished imports, indicating the amount of goods that stayed in the country for consumption, improved by 27 percent to a deficit of $962 million, as polished exports still exceeded imports during the month .
Rough imports fell 42 percent to $21 million and rough exports dropped 14 percent to $12 million. Net rough imports, representing imports minus exports, declined 59 percent to $9 million .
During the first half of 2015, U.S. polished imports were flat at $12.25 billion, while polished exports fell 12 percent to $10.2 billion. Net polished imports almost tripled to $2.1 billion .
Rough imports declined 68 percent to $117 million, while rough exports dropped 70 percent to $74 million. Net rough imports fell 68 percent to $43 million. The U.S. net diamond account more than tripled to $2 billion during the six month period.
