PUBLISHED
September 06, 2025
KARACHI:
Millions of hearts must have broken with the official Instagram announcement of Taylor Swift’s engagement, after a two-year relationship, with football player Travis Kelce. The newly engaged couple’s joint social media post not only sent fans buzzing, but also set some stocks and prediction markets on the roll, sparking the latest example of the power of Swift’s influence on America’s corporate and economic world.
Ripples in the economy of America began because Kelce proposed to Swift with an old mine, brilliant cut diamond ring. Move over Ambanis! This numbers game is not about Sabyasachi lehngas or Gucci saris.
Now this wasn’t just another large diamond ring. It was not even like the Solomon’s Seal, nor the Ring of Gyges. This was a five million dollar ring, nothing less. Through a written statement, Jared Jewelers told CNBC that this engagement ring could cost approximately $250,000 to $500,000, [Rs141,906,450.50], which makes it costlier than Lady Diana’s engagement sapphire ring that cost around £50,000 at the time it was purchased and is today estimated to be worth $400,000. But then she was getting married into the royal family to become a princess.
Designed by 30-year-old Kindred Lubeck at Artifex Fine Jewelry in New York City, this sparkling chunky rock is hard to miss on Swift’s slender pinky in the engagement photos of their social media post. Lubeck, jeweler and engraver, who began designing jewelry in 2019 works for her grandfather, Jay Lubeck’s company, known for its vintage inspired, luxury jewelry designs.
For the uninitiated few, well … almost no one doesn’t know Taylor Swift, as she is a globally recognised “untouchable superstar” with a massive fan base across various music genres. Undoubtedly, one of the most prominent celebrities of the 21st century, Taylor Swift is considered an economic engine rising out of the pandemic. The boost to consumer spending tied to her worldwide “Eras” tour in 2023, caught the attention of both Wall Street and the US Federal Reserve.
But just her pandemic rise is not what her massive popularity stems from. It is her versatile talent as a songwriter and musician across various genres, her deep, relatable connection with a loyal fandom through detailed storytelling and emotional vulnerability, her successful business and marketing savvy, and her influential advocacy for artists’ rights within the music industry that makes her a star celebrity.
Coming back to the ring, Swifties, as Swift’s fans are called, may not find it easy to follow the trend because according to a diamond expert, due to their rarity, true old mine diamonds can be harder to source. Now that everyone is talking about old mine diamonds, what kind of precious rocks are these? Old mine diamonds are antique diamonds that were primarily cut in the 18th and 19th centuries to retain as much weight from the rough diamond as possible, rather than for maximum brilliance, which gives them a distinct, less sparkly, and more irregular look. There’s a new (old) diamond on Swift’s engagement ring, now in its second life and enjoying a helluva bussin’ reputation!
Tom Moses, executive vice president and chief laboratory and research officer at the Gemological Institute of America, explains in a People magazine interview that stones in this category date back to the 1800s when each diamond had to be shaped entirely by hand. While it’s not confirmed what time period Swift’s specific stone was sourced from, Moses added that original stones from this era are extremely rare, in part because as new cutting technologies emerged, older stones were often recut or repurposed so that a well-preserved original is something collectors and enthusiasts value. Apparently, no two old mine cut diamonds are alike because of the hand-cut technique used in the past. These specific diamonds are typically square with rounded corners and feature 58 facets. Old-fashioned cutters would follow the shape of the diamond’s natural form and these would lack a standardised and unified look, and could well be a bit asymmetrical.
Although for the studied and eagle-eyed, there are a few signature elements that make the overall old mine cut stand out from the rest. It’s not confirmed yet whether Swift’s exact diamond was plucked from a rare batch; however, even if it wasn’t, brands and designers say that the old mine cut can be replicated on real modern diamonds or manufactured ones. Hold this thought for a bit.
Enter Max Rosenblum, who describes himself as armchair investigative economic journalist. His post on Swift’s engagement ring went viral as he believes that the bigger and far more interesting issue is the economic ripple effect of Swift’s ring, much more than the ring itself. While the rest of the world was ogling at the engagement photos, Rosenblum was studying the knock-on effect on the market.
According to him, it began with shares of Signet Jewelers, the world’s largest retailer of diamond jewelry in the US, showing heavy volume. Brilliant Earth, an American company that sells jewelry featuring ethnically sourced diamonds and other gemstones, which rocketed over 26 percent. Ethically sourced diamonds can be either mined or lab-grown and by the way while we are at this, a 2.08 carat, oval, lab-grown, super ideal cut diamond that is E colour and has VVS2 clarity costs about the equivalent of Rs925,000.
“What this represents is a calculated bet on a seismic shift in consumer preferences,” says Rosenblum in his Instagram video. “What we are talking about here is that it’s an estimated 8-12 carat elongated old mine brilliant cut diamond. This isn’t your standard mass-market brilliant cut optimised for the 4 Cs [cut, colour, clarity and carat weight].”
We have already learnt that the value of an old mine diamond lies in its imperfections and rarity, a large open coulée, and blockier facets designed to sparkle in candlelight, ideally for a candlelit proposal. Unlike diamonds sourced from a global luxury houses such as Tiffany’s, Rosenblum points out that this one came from Artifex.
Since this is a flight to scarcity and a narrative over standardised, quantifiable metrics, because this ring is a strategic masterstroke in the diamond industry’s proxy war against its own existential threat: lab-grown diamonds. Rosenblum further enlightens us about the lab-grown market. “The lab-grown market has achieved near-perfect commoditisation, offering flawless clarity and colour at a fraction of the cost. In other words, they’ve weaponised perfection.”
Rosenblum highlighted that the natural diamond industry can’t compete on price or flawlessness, so it’s pivoted to selling the one thing a lab can’t replicate: history. Swift and Kelce’s choice of an antique hand-cut, centuries-old natural stone isn’t just a preference; it’s the ultimate market differentiator. It reframes value away from sterile perfection and towards character, provenance, and the romance of a one-of-one asset. No one else can have it. This turns out to be a likely unintentional targeted campaign against the perceived soullessness of its synthetic counterpart. Rosenblum makes sense. The economic ripples are astounding and an eye opener.
While shares of Signet Jewelers, one of few publicly traded jewelry companies on major exchanges, jumped more than 6 percent the day after the engagement announcement, gaining 3 percent more than the actual engagement-announcement day following the couple’s post, other companies too spun after the engagement news.
The clothes Swift and Kelce wore in the photographs in the post were by Ralph Lauren, so as a result of the their preference for the brand, the company’s shares rose by 2 percent on the engagement post day and 0.5 percent the following day, setting a positive for the stock.
American Eagle shares jumped more than 8 percent the day after the engagement post, after the retailer announced a collaboration with Kelce’s sportswear brand Tru Kolors. Kelce is headlining a campaign tied to the collection.
More brands rushed to cash in the cultural cache of the Swift-Kelce engagement. Domino’s Pizza and GrubHub pushed alerts to app users, with each referencing Swift’s songs and including a ring emoji. Even Soda producer Poppi shared an Instagram photo themed to the duo’s social media caption.
Why should prediction markets be left behind? They also lit up on the latest cultural moment. A Kalshi bet on the likelihood that the two would be married by the end of 2025 shot up directly following the couple’s engagement announcement.
Who knew a centuries-old diamond could double as a crystal ball for America’s economy? In true Taylor Swift style, this wasn’t just an engagement — it was a market-moving, brand-boosting, prediction-spiking cultural moment. Love may be priceless, but somehow it just added billions in shareholder value and turned a vintage rock into Wall Street’s newest obsession. And now the real question is — how on earth are other celebrities supposed to top this? I am particularly curious to know how is this going to sit on Bollywood’s cheat sheets across the border, where we have seen the most obscene displays of wealth.
