this post was submitted on 01 Jun 2025
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Futurology

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Diamond prices are down 60% since a 2011 high, and they are still falling. It's not all down to lab-grown diamonds, demand is down too, especially in China.

No one can lab-grow gold yet, so its rarity and scarcity protect its value, but that will end too. It's just a question of when. China launched an asteroid touch-down mission this week, which will make it the 4th country/region to do so, after Europe, the US & Japan.

How soon will it be feasible to mine asteroids? Who knows, but a breakthrough in space propulsion might mean the prospect happens quickly when it does. It's possible gold has twenty years or less of being high value left.

The $80 Billion Diamond Market Crash Leaves De Beers Reeling

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[–] mysticpickle@lemmy.ca 34 points 1 week ago (1 children)
[–] Jimmycakes@lemmy.world 19 points 1 week ago
[–] Speculater@lemmy.world 33 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Have we even confirmed there are asteroids made of gold yet?

[–] GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca 33 points 1 week ago (2 children)
[–] Rubisco@slrpnk.net 34 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Surely there exists a better source. Not clicking on Fox News.

[–] chocosoldier@lemmy.blahaj.zone 33 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

Here is an archived snapshot I found of the Fox article

At the bottom it says the story originally ran in The Sun, here is a snapshot of that page as well.

I followed the other user's snarky DDG link and the first hit is this article from Smithsonian Magazine that appears to be about the same story.

Finally, here is a far less sweaty page from NASA about the actual object, though the composition of metals isn't discussed in detail.

After skimming all this I kinda feel like it's a stretch to say that asteroid is "made of gold".

[–] GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca 17 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I think "enough gold to completely destroy the gold industry (as a precious metal)" is close enough to "made of gold" for me.

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[–] Rubisco@slrpnk.net 6 points 1 week ago
[–] M137@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Do you not understand the offense you just did by linking to fucking fox news? Seriously?

[–] GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca 10 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Pearls in pig slop, I know. They reference another article, give the asteroid name, give a list of expected metals to be found, and wrap it in a lovely Fox News bow of some pundit giving his idea of what that all means for the rest of us. As journalism goes, it's top tier for Fox.

[–] Clinicallydepressedpoochie@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Surprised fox didnt comment how this is against the natural order and bringing back gold from space will unleash a hoard of demons on the earth.

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[–] RedWizard@hexbear.net 20 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Diamonds are rare on the surface of the earth, and their discovery therefore costs on the average much labour-time. Consequently, they represent much labour in a small volume of space. Jacob doubts that gold has ever paid its complete value. This holds true even more for diamonds. According to Eschwege, by 1823 the complete yield of the eight-year old Brazilian diamond-diggings had not yet amounted to the value of the 1½ year average product of the Brazilian sugar or coffee plantations. Given more richly laden diggings the same quantum of labour would be represented by more diamonds and their value would sink. If one succeeds in converting coal into diamonds with little labour, then the value of diamonds would sink beneath that of paving stones.

-- Karl Marx, Capital Vol. 1

[–] Hansae@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 points 1 week ago

I swear at times Marx had a time machine.

[–] chaosCruiser@futurology.today 19 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Can’t wait for the day when we can have proper corrosion resistant materials. Just gold plate the hull of a ship, and salt water can’t do much.

[–] qjkxbmwvz@startrek.website 21 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Would that really help though? Gold is super soft so I think it would need to get frequently coated/plated again


and we already have pretty good and resistant marine paint.

Titanium is very corrosion resistant, not to mention plastics/fiberglass/carbon fiber, as I understand.

But yeah, cheap gold would be be great, just seems to me that the market would more be in e.g. electronics, where both corrosion resistance and electrical conductivity are required (something gold is fairly unique at).

[–] chaosCruiser@futurology.today 6 points 1 week ago

Yeah, well maybe ships weren't the best example.

Low wear resistance of gold is a significant issue, which definitely limits the number of potential applications, but I guess gold alloys could still be useful. For example, titanium has a bunch of alloys for different purposes, some more corrosion resistant than others, while others were optimized more towards wear resistance.

Titanium can also catch fire, which makes it a very tricky metal to use. Putting out a fire like that is pretty much impossible, so if your titanium cladded reactor catches fire, all you can realistically do is try to prevent the rest of the building from burning down. The reactor itself is gone at that point, so all you can do is wish you had paid for the gold cladding instead.

Also, the electrical conductivity of gold is amazing. If gold was as cheap as iron, we would definitely use lots of it in various electrical appliances.

If you can mine gold from asteroids, you're probably also going to find silver and platinum. Those two have some amazing properties too, so I think asteroid mining has great potential to permanently revolutionize a bunch of industries.

[–] Hirom@beehaw.org 14 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

It's good to see diamond mining being replaced by artificial diamond manufacturing, which appears to be better envitonmentally and socially.

But I wouldn't compare diamonds to gold. Because gold is an element that can't be manufactured (without a particule accelerator and an insane amount of energy).

Asteroid mining is still science fiction.

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[–] 0x0@lemmy.zip 13 points 1 week ago (14 children)

The breaktrough for asteroid mining isn't propulsion but how to mine and process ore in a vacuum.

[–] ikidd@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Actually it's surviving the radiation outside the Van Allen belts.

[–] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 10 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Robots. Autonomous probes.

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[–] stevedice@sh.itjust.works 12 points 1 week ago (7 children)

I'm skeptical about the feasibility of transporting heavy metals through space. Also, diamond were never scarce, it was all literally market manipulation.

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[–] AntiOutsideAktion@hexbear.net 10 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Diamonds aren't expensive because they're rare; they're not. The monopoly is why they're expensive. That's not going to change with space mining.

The reason diamonds are becoming cheaper is because the barrier to entry is being lowered. Having a private space program more advanced than any nation state as a barrier of entry will not have the same effect.

[–] Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 points 1 week ago

Asteroid mining would collapse the markets for most minerals, except perhaps the higher volume stuff like iron.

[–] figjam@midwest.social 9 points 1 week ago (1 children)

It's possible gold has twenty years or less of being high value left.

In 20 years florida and NYC may be underwater.

[–] Prethoryn@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

In 20 years Flordians won't have teeth.

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[–] kreskin@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Excellent. One of Israels biggest exports is finished gemstones. I hope they are crushed.

[–] Anomalocaris@lemm.ee 6 points 1 week ago (3 children)

they don't mine them. just process them. not sure it's lowering the cost of raw diamonds will change the processing cost.

its morning and haven't had my coffee, so I'm on instinct. I feel like it would lower the cost.

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[–] hark@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago (4 children)

But the plummeting price of gold from the abundance would make the asteroid mining commercially nonviable. As an aside, only 7.16% of the gold demand in the world is actually for technology: https://www.statista.com/statistics/299609/gold-demand-by-industry-sector-share/

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[–] someguy3@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (4 children)

Why not lab grown gold?

*(it's not a serious question)

[–] bob_lemon@feddit.org 23 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Because of nuclear physics.

Diamonds are just carbon atoms arranged in a particular repeating structure (a lattice). So you can go from, say, graphite to diamond without touching the atoms themselves.

Gold, on the other hand is not about structure, but the atomic cores themselves, which contain exactly 79 protons. Going from one type of atom to another type requires some form of fission (breaking larger cores into smaller pieces) or fusion (smashing two smaller cores together). I don't think there are (viable) fission "recipes" that yield gold. And fusion requires insanely high temperatures or pressures even for smaller atoms (were talking center of the sun here).

[–] trungulox@lemm.ee 10 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I fused with your mom last night.

[–] kreskin@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Cut it out, dad.

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[–] danhab99@programming.dev 17 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Alchemists have been trying for thousands of years, you're welcome to join them

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[–] aquinteros@lemmy.world 10 points 1 week ago

they actually made gold from lead, in the hadron collider. but it was a few particles, and very unstable, still gold!

[–] Ek-Hou-Van-Braai@piefed.social 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Diamonds are just Carbon atoms in Chrystal form.

You can take carbon from say coal, turn it into a Chrystal and you've got a diamond.

Gold is just gold atoms, you can't make gold atoms

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[–] plyth@feddit.org 6 points 1 week ago (2 children)

If the price of gold plunges one day, it should already plunge today. In other words, the probability for success of those mining operations is low.

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[–] BmeBenji@lemm.ee 6 points 1 week ago

Ah, yes, the notoriously accessible and inexpensive field of launching rockets, landing said rocket on a giant sized bullet so a robot can go drill in it for weeks to dig up thousands of pounds of rock, lifting the robot that now weighs significantly more off of the giant bullet, and safely returning it to our larger, slightly slower bullet.

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