There has been speculation galore since Anglo American began throwing out a financial lifeline to diamond company De Beers. Mining Weekly writes.

Then the whispers turned into headlines that De Beers was going to be relisted to raise equity capital to put a dent into its $2 billion debt.

But, according to miningweekly, Anglo American CEO Cynthia Carroll was adamant during a conference call in which journalists fired questions at her in rapid succession.

They wanted to know what was to become of De Beers now that CEO Gareth Penny is stepping down.

Carroll said Anglo had no intention of hiving off diamond company De Beers in a relisting.

“Our focus is very much on driving the business for value. The business is on very solid ground with the recent refinancing and we continue to regard De Beers as a core business,” she said.

Diamond production was up by 134%, sales up by 84% and costs were being contained.

“We have a very close relationship with the De Beers management, which probably came about through the challenges around refinancing that we had earlier. We are very well connected.”

On Penny’s stepping down, Carroll explained that “he simply elected to do something else”, after spending 22 years with the diamond company, the last five as CEO.