Finance
Diamond Dealers Cling to the Old Days
It's a corner of global business that's been barely touched by 21st century capitalism. Now banks want their money.
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Ashit Mehta was stunned. Without notice, the representatives of Dutch bank ABN Amro marched into the offices of his global diamond empire, confiscated $150 million of rocks, locked them in a vault and left with the key.
What began on that overcast December day in 2012 turned out to be just the start of the problems for the secretive family-run diamond trading houses that have defined the Belgian city of Antwerp for centuries.