In China, the new iPhone 6 is currently a rare commodity and some people are willing to pay higher to get the new model now.
Apple's iPhone 6 already debuted in countries like Australia, Japan, Hong Kong and U.S. but there is still no set release date for other markets. In Beijing, one "grey market" reseller is selling the 16 gigabyte iPhone 6 for as much as 8,000 yuan (roughly equivalent to $1,300), which is double the price in the Apple website of Hong Kong. Other vendors are offering as high as $2,400, compared to Hong Kong's $927.
In China, consumers typically wait for around three months before new Apple products come in. This produces a surge of grey market sellers for these products. Whenever Apple releases a new product, many people try to take advantage by selling the new models at a higher price before the product officially becomes available in their country. It is not the grey market that only benefits but also the individual sellers trying to make at least 50 or up to 150 percent of their phone's value.
Arbitrage in the Apple industry is also common in other countries. In the Philippines, grey market for iPhone 6 is at Php 92,500 (equivalent to $2,100) for the 16 gig, Php 102,500 ($2,350) for the 64 gig and Php 108,500 ($2,500) for the 128 gig. People are doing this arbitrage because there is so much demand in the market that people are willing to pay a very high premium just for them to have the new model before everyone else.
Last year, Apple's phones arrived in China the same day as their Global debut. In the previous years, smuggling of phones were adamant due to the three month lag. Apple managed to earn $5.9 billion in sales in the furth quarter last year from China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. That amount is 16 percent of the company's total sales. Accoding to the International Data Group, Apple has only around 6 percent market share in China, behind Samsung Electronics Co. and Xiaomi Corp.
