About Platinum

Platinum is the rarest of the precious metals. Roughly 90% of all platinum supplies come from South Africa and Russia. Virtually all of the platinum mined in South Africa is pre-sold to industrial users. In contrast with gold and silver, there are no large above-ground platinum stockpiles to fill the gap against significant supply disruptions. Approximately 8 tons of raw ore must be mined to produce just one pure ounce of platinum. Today, the finest and most elegant jewelry contains platinum.

Platinum jewelry has gone from being a thing of the art deco past to being all the rage in North America and China. The largest economy in the world and the largest country in the world are seeing tremendous growth in platinum jewelry demand. This is in addition to Japan's relatively stable consumption of the white metal for jewelry purposes. While growth has been strong, overall market share is still low - meaning that these trends of increasing demand are sustainable for some time to come.

Part of platinum's appeal lies in the fact that it dulls very little over time and never tarnishes. Platinum is a hypo-allergenic metal that will not irritate the skin. Most platinum jewelry is 95 percent pure platinum, and 5 percent iridium or palladium alloy. For guaranteed quality in platinum, look for the marks 900Pt, 950 Plat, or Plat. Below are the explanations for the marks you see in platinum:

• 950 parts or more per thousand of pure platinum can be marked "Platinum" without the use of any qualifying statements;
• 850 to 950 parts per thousand can be marked in accordance with international standards of "950 Plat." or "950 Pt.," "900 Plat."or "900 Pt.,"
• "850 Plat." or "850 Pt." (the revised guide permits the use of a two or four letter abbreviation for platinum);
• 500 parts per thousand of pure platinum and at least 950 parts per thousand platinum group metals can be marked with the parts per thousand of pure platinum, followed by the parts per thousand of each platinum group metal (example: "600Plat.350Irid." or "600Pt.350Ir."; and
• less than 500 parts per thousand pure platinum cannot be marked with the word platinum or any abbreviation thereof.