GEMSTONE WEIGHTS
ARE NOT STAMPED

The hallmark that guarantees the quality of a piece of jewelry is necessary, but other than for especially valuable main stones, gemstone weights do not need to be stamped. The quality of gemstones is judged based on beauty, the presence of defects, and size-it is a mistake to put emphasis on weight. Carat weight is used as a reference for size, but many thickly cut stones are simply heavy, and lack beauty. Keeping track of stone weights during the manufacturing process is important from a quality control standpoint, but it only needs to be kept as a record of specifications for backup purposes.

Stone weights are sometimes stamped in jewelry to the third decimal place, which is even more unnecessary. The third decimal place is basically an insignificant number. Differences in value for gemstones of the same size can be ten times or one-tenth, depending on beauty, but a 0.01-carat weight difference has no bearing on the quality and value of the stone. The fundamental use of carat weight is as a reference to represent the size of different gemstones, such as in “one-carat size,” or “three-carat size.”

In the sales competition of low-quality jewelry, promotions are often based on the notion of “so many carats at such a low price.” This should be interpreted as “such large and low-quality garbage.” The reason for not stamping carat weights in jewelry is not to deceive the consumer.
Other than for the purpose of confirming the identity of special gemstones, reliance on carat weight will cause one to lose sight of the true value of gemstones.