Board

Executive Committee

Harry Levy, Chairman

Harry Levy was named Chairman of the London Diamond Bourse in April 2016. He has over forty five years in the diamond and gemstone industry. He has also served the industry in a variety of capacities throughout his public career.

Prior to being our Chairman, Mr Levy served as President from 2011 to 2016 and several terms as Vice President of the London Diamond Bourse, and also held the Chairmanship of the British Jewellers Association and in addition was the President of GEM-A. He has served on the Coloured Stone Commission, the International Diamond Council and helped promote World Jewellery Confederation CIBJO. Furthermore he has served on the Laboratory Commission, and for ten years, through March 2008, was president of the Diamond Commission.

Harry Levy’s career began after dabbling in the gemstone trade while lecturing in his professional field of mathematics, in which he holds a Masters degree. A few years later he left the academic world and became fully engaged in the gemstone trade and founded his own company in London, Levy Gems. In addition to a Masters degree in mathematics, Harry Levy holds a degree in philosophy, and is a Fellow of the British Gemmological Association.

Alan Cohen, President

Alan Cohen has been in the diamond business since 1971. He trained as a rough and polished diamond sorter in South Africa. He has been an independent dealer in polished and rough diamonds based in London from 1974 to 1991. Buying both rough and polished diamonds in Africa. Alan lived and worked in Moscow, Russia from 1991 — 2006.

Daniel Seller, Vice President

Dan has 40 years experience of producing fine handmade jewellery, manufacturing for both the trade, and public consumers with a focus on supporting UK craftsmen & workshops. He has a wealth of knowledge and expertise both inside and outside of the industry beneficial to the board & our membership.

David Joffe, Treasurer

David Joffe has been in the diamond trade for the past 43 years. His company was a De Beers sightholder in Johannesburg, South Africa. In 1977 he moved to London. He has traded in both rough and polished diamonds and travelled to all parts of the world both buying and selling stones. David is part of the Executive Committee and holds the role of Treasurer of the London Diamond Bourse – a post he has held for 20 years. David has been on the board for some 25 years.

Trevor Sigsworth, Executive Officer

Trevor is a precious stone specialist. Having been in the trade for his whole career some 44 years. He started out as a precious stone sorter and buyer, and started on his own in his early 20’s .He has travelled all over the world in pursuit of obtaining fine gem stones from the mines and cutters to supply manufacturers the best that is available. Trevor is a specialist in his field and is regularly relied on to give opinion on all types of stones.

Council of Management

Menachem Prager

Menachem Prager is the Principal of a successful diamond company and believes in the highest standards of ethics. He has been a member of the London Diamond Bourse for thirty eight years, and has served as President of the LDB and on the World Federation of Diamond Bourse’s International arbitration panel.

He was born in Antwerp, Belgium into a diamond family, where he learned to cleave rough diamonds. After his arrival in the UK, he turned his skills first towards semi-precious stones, then polished diamonds, and specialises in rounds, as well as fancy-cut diamonds.

Paul Koppelman

Paul Koppelman entered the diamond trade in 1970 after graduating in Political Philosophy and Government and Law. He spent two and a half years learning diamond cleaving and diamond polishing before joining the family business which dealt mainly in rough diamonds. Paul broadened the business into industrial diamonds.

He now specialises in Rough Diamonds under one carat as well as Diamond Powders and a completely full range of Industrial Diamonds. Besides his main office in London, his company also has an office in the Diamond Bourse in Antwerp to assist his international business as 90% of the turnover are exports.

In 1978 he was first elected to the committee of the London Diamond Club and ended up in 1993 as its Financial Director, prior to its amalgamation with the London Diamond Bourse. Following the merger in 1995 he was joint treasurer of the London Bourse and Club till 1998.

In 1995 he was responsible for compiling the rules of the two combined Bourses and has held that responsibility for the last twenty-three years.

In 2002 Paul was instrumental in helping Clive Wright of the Government Diamond Office draw up the KP regulations, concerning the Kimberley Process in the UK. Since then he has been the member of the council of management on the LDB with special responsibility for the Kimberley Process in the UK.

Peter Hofer

Having embarked on a career in the jewellery trade in 1981, Peter has been involved in the wholesale, manufacturing and retail sides of the industry. He started in Hatton Garden working for a fine quality manufacturing wholesale company on the production side which led to a career in retail in the West End for Cartier and Bulgari. Having graduated from the G.I.A. in 1994, he decided to ‘go it alone’ and subsequently embarked on a career of Diamond broking and undertaking commissions of fine jewellery.

Charles Silverton

Charles has worked in his long-established family wholesale jewellery business D. I. Silverton Ltd for almost 10 years and has specialised in the sorting and grading of polished diamonds in all shapes and sizes. He was taught the fundamentals of diamond grading by his father David who has worked in the industry for nearly 50 years and has subsequently built on that knowledge through practical application and a keen eye for detail. He now sells loose polished diamonds and precious gemstones, as well as fine jewellery to retail and working jewellers throughout the UK, with a special focus on finely matched pairs, sets and layout for manufacturing.

Charles has been a member of the London Diamond Bourse for 3 years and now travels nationally and internationally both buying and selling diamonds and precious gemstones as a director of the business from their original Leeds office and from the London Diamond Bourse.

David Troostwyk

David Troostwyk began his career in Antwerp working for several Sightholders and then going on to establish the first online electronic diamond exchange. He returned to his native UK in 2011 to set up Salotro, a diamond trading company. The same year he joined the London Diamond Bourse and The Young Diamantaires Group. His extensive expertise cover many levels of the diamond pipeline and he uses this experience to implement initiatives to bring through the next generation of diamantaires.

Katherine Chappell

Kathy has worked in the gemstone business for over 20 years. She emigrated to Canada as a child in 1965, settling in the gold mining town of Red Lake, northwest Ontario and later in the diamond province of Guyana and then in South Africa, returning to the UK in 1974. Through the family gemstone business she has successfully marketed the Nyala Rubyᵀᴹ from the Chimwadzulu mine in Malawi. She buys stones from source and has a working relationship with Columbia Gem House of the USA, a leading proponent of ethical sourcing and distribution. She is a distributor for CanadaMark diamonds from the Dominion Diamond Corporation. Her client list includes wholesale and retail jewellers committed to fair trade principles. She is a member of Women in Mining. She assists her father, David Hargreaves, a long-standing mining engineer in the preparation and presentation of consultancy reports on gemstone mines worldwide.