Ernest Oppenheimer

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Ernest Oppenheimer, seated right (1945)

Sir Ernest Oppenheimer , originally Ernst Oppenheimer (born May 22, 1880 in Friedberg (Hesse) , † November 25, 1957 in Johannesburg (South Africa)) was the founder of the diamond cartel under the De Beers company .

Life

Ernst Oppenheimer was born as the fifth son of the Jewish cigar dealer Edward Oppenheimer in Friedberg (Hesse). At the age of 17 he started an apprenticeship with his uncle Anton Dunkelsbuhler in London and worked in his company Dunkelsbuhler & Company . After the end of the Second Boer War in 1902, Oppenheimer moved to Kimberley , South Africa , at the center of the diamond industry , as a representative of the gemstone dealer . In 1906, at the end of his apprenticeship, he married Mary Lina Pollak in London. Back in Kimberley, Oppenheimer first became a city councilor and then, at the age of 32, mayor.

On the run from anti-German riots after the sinking of the RMS Lusitania in the First World War , Oppenheimer emigrated from the South African Union to England in 1915 and took on British citizenship . Since then he has called himself Ernest Oppenheimer.

In 1916 he moved back to South Africa, this time to Johannesburg , and founded the Anglo American Corporation on September 25, 1917, supported by the American bank JP Morgan . It became one of the most successful mining companies in the world through trading in raw materials. When the mining company De Beers , founded by Cecil Rhodes in 1888 , got into trouble, Oppenheimer got involved and became president of this company in 1920. In 1929, Anglo American had finally gained control of De Beers.

On February 11, 1921, King George V made him a Knight Bachelor ("Sir").

The diamond syndicate

However, Ernest Oppenheimer laid the foundations for a world power with the founding of the Central Selling Organization (CSO), a cartel that for decades controlled up to 90 percent of the global diamond market. From then on, experts and critics spoke of the “syndicate”.

In 1930, during the Great Depression , he bought the global diamond markets empty and in 1950 founded the Central Selling Organization under his world monopoly . The world trade in diamonds was now in the hands of the company's 180 members. The sale took place according to a fixed system that still exists today. De Beers had rough diamonds shipped centrally to London from all over the world. There they were packed in the smallest boxes and forwarded to wholesalers and grinders on certain dates. De Beers dictated the contents of the boxes and the price. Leaving the cartel seemed almost impossible.

The American jeweler Harry Winston discovered this in the 1940s. He wanted to acquire rough diamonds from Angola outside the De Beers Syndicate. The powerful organization did not accept this and is said to have turned on the British government and thereby thwarted the project. A settlement was reached , and Winston - now known as Winston Inc. one of the world's largest luxury diamond dealers - were given better terms with De Beers.

During the Second World War , Oppenheimer rejected US President Franklin D. Roosevelt's request for industrial diamonds for fear of falling prices . As a result, he was banned from entering the United States and all De Beers activities there had to be discontinued due to antitrust violations.

After his first wife, with whom he had two sons, died in 1934 and the following year his son Frank was killed in a swimming accident in Madeira, he got into a personal crisis and converted to Christianity. A few months later he married Caroline "Ina" Harvey, the daughter of an English baron and widow of his nephew Michael, who died in a 1933 airplane accident.

In 1957 Oppenheimer died, his syndicate was continued by his son Harry Frederick Oppenheimer . His brother Sir Bernard Oppenheimer (1866–1921) was also involved in the diamond trade. Harry's son Nicholas "Nicky" F. Oppenheimer (born June 8, 1945), with Anglo American since 1968, had to give up power for the first time in 1982 when an American took over the helm at Anglo-American, which is still the case today is. In 2011, the Oppenheimer family sold the remaining 40% stake in De Beers to Anglo American for around $ 5.1 billion . Nicky manages $ 6 billion in assets , according to Forbes Magazine .

In 2001 the Central Selling Organization was dissolved due to image problems. In 2004 De Beers prepared an admission of guilt on allegations of cartel formation against the United States.

Afterlife

The Ernest Oppenheimer Bridge between Oranjemund (Namibia) and Alexander Bay (South Africa) is named after Ernest Oppenheimer .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ see Hessisches Staatsarchiv Marburg (HStAMR), Best. 924 No. 534, p. 57 ( digitized version ).
  2. ↑ Knights and Dames: MIG-OS at Leigh Rayment's Perrage
  3. ↑ In the film blondes preferred (1953; original title Gentlemen Prefer Blondes ) Marilyn Monroe sings Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend ("Diamonds are a girl's best friend"). The song contains a spoken center piece that suggests these processes: Talk to me, Harry Winston, tell me all about it! ("Talk to me, Harry Winston, tell me all about it!")
  4. ↑ Harry Winston Inc., Company History (English)
  5. ^ Bettina Schulz: Family Oppenheimer: The diamond cutters . In: FAZ.NET . ISSN  0174-4909 ( faz.net [accessed May 1, 2020]).

Web links


personal data
SURNAME Oppenheimer, Ernest
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Oppenheimer, Ernst
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British diamond dealer
DATE OF BIRTH May 22, 1880
PLACE OF BIRTH Friedberg (Hesse)
DATE OF DEATH November 25, 1957
Place of death Johannesburg