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Collectors Universe, Inc., a publicly traded company that authenticates and grades collectible coins, sports cards, autographs, stamps, and currency, has now added diamonds to that list.

In November 2005, Collectors Universe acquired Gem Certification & Appraisal Lab, the New York diamond grading laboratory headed by noted gemologist Don Palmieri. Then in December 2005, the company acquired Gemprint Corporation, the company with a patented technology for non-invasive diamond identification. GCAL will now offer diamond certificates that include a Gemprint identification.

These acquisitions signal that Collectors Universe is serious about becoming a force in jewelry, as it is in collectibles. The company had a net income of $4.8 million on sales of $33 million for the financial year ending June 30, 2005. The company says it will invest an additional $60 million in cash to assist in growing the GCAL business.

Collectors Universe also brings the marketing and regulation of a public company to the diamond grading business. That marketing operation is already promoting the new GCAL report with Gemprint ID as a safe alternative in a scandal-rocked industry.

For the last five years, GCAL has been offering the industry’s only diamond grade guarantee. GCAL guarantees color and clarity grade accuracy to within one grade of GIA or the lab will refund the difference in value in cash.

“We believe that our use of Gemprint technology will represent a significant advancement in the security of the diamond grading certificate. We will be able to implement anti-fraud and anti-counterfeiting measures that will make the GCAL grading certificate the most secure and trustworthy diamond grading certificate anywhere,” Palmieri says.

All GCAL graded diamonds are now registered with the Gemprint stored in a database. Gemprints can easily be checked by retailers by using an inexpensive Gemprint ISI verification system that captures the unique “gemprint” of any GCAL certified diamond and connects to the GCAL registered database over the Internet for verification of the certificate number assigned to that diamond. This means that every buyer of a GCAL graded diamond can verify, manage, and control their diamond purchases and related inventory.

Founded in 1986 and publicly traded since 1999, Collectors Universe grades over 2.8 million items valued in excess of $1.3 billion each year.