With the rapid development of the jewellery market, China has become the second-largest jewellery market after the United States.
The consumption of some important jewellery products ranks among the top of the world.
Under the impact of the international financial crisis and the downward pressure from the domestic economy, in 2012, the growth of China’s jewellery industry slowed down, but still maintained a good development trend. The total sales revenue of jewellery retail market was 400 billion yuan, showing a slight increase over last year.
In 2012, the total consumption of gold jewellery was 502.75 tons, having a year-on-year growth of 10 per cent. In 2011, the consumption of platinum jewellery was 52.4 tons, accounting for 68.3 per cent of the global total consumption of platinum jewellery.
In 2011, the total consumption of diamond jewellery was more than 25 billion yuan, surpassing Japan for the first time, and ranking the second in the world; China is the world’s largest jade processing and consuming country, the annual consumption of jade is more than 20 billion yuan; the annual production of pearl is about 1400 tons, accounting for more than 95 per cent of the world annual production of pearl.
At present, China’s jewellery industry is in a stage of rapid development. There is no one brand occupying absolute market share; market concentration ratios remain low.
The main jewellery brands are Cartier, Bulgari, Tiffany, and some other world’s top brands. Chow Tai Fook, TSL Jewellery in Hong Kong, Lao Feng Xiang, CHJ and some other brands occupy the leading position in the domestic market. Besides, Diamond in Beijing, Cuihua in Shenyang and some other regional brands have a certain degree of competitive advantage in their own advantageous regions.
With the diversification of jewellery consumption, the jewellery market is constantly divided into more market segments, the brands are enriched, and the intrinsic quality is also improved. Gold, platinum, diamond jewellery and colored gemstones, jade, silver jewellery show their charm in the market, especially gold, platinum, diamond jewelry have huge development potential.
The consumption of diamond is growing at the annual rate of 15 per cent in China.
