Tech-Hungry Sellers Dumping Old Jewels January 10, 2000 – Posted in: Press

By: JEFF OSTROWISKI
Published: January 10, 2000
Palm Beach Post

The Internet gold rush is leading to its own mini-stampede here.
Wealthy Palm Beachers are selling diamonds and using the proceeds to buy tech stocks, says Tobina Kahn, vice president of House of Kahn jewelers in Palm Beach. Kahn says she has bought $100,000 in jewelry in the past few weeks from customers who don’t want to miss out on the technology-driven bull market.

House of Kahn paid one grandmother $37,000 for a pair of four-carat diamond earrings. The jeweler paid another seller $20,000 for a diamond bracelet made in the 1920s.

The owners typically wore the items only once a year, Kahn says. The jewels spent the other 364 days in safe deposit boxes.

“Yes, these are beautiful works of art, and you can’t deny that,” Kahn says. “But what else can you do with the money?”

House of Kahn, which also has a store in Chicago, sells to dealers and collectors.