Uh what? Are scalpers now charging people more than $ 2,000 to own the Nvidia RTX 3080?
Unfortunately, the continuing scarcity of the latest PC video cards is causing the prices of Nvidia’s RTX 3000 GPUs to skyrocket to disturbing new heights on eBay.
Since mid-September, money changers have been reselling the RTX 3080 on eBay for about $ 1,300 to $ 1,500, which is almost double the original cost of $ 699 to $ 869, depending on the model. But in recent weeks, the price of graphics cards on demand has become even more absurd.
Credit: Michael Driscoll
To understand the full scope of scalping, a Chicago-based data engineer named Michael Driscoll has been monitoring GPU sales on eBay using a computer script. On Tuesday, he told us that average prices for the RTX 3080 now reach $ 2,069.
Average prices on eBay for all RTX 3000 cards started to rise in February. In the case of the RTX 3080, costs skyrocketed to around $ 2,400. The RTX 3070, on the other hand, hit a high of more than $ 1,200.
Credit: Michael Driscoll
The numbers only started to drop last week, during the same time that Nvidia launched its most affordable product in the RTX 3000 series, the 3060, which costs $ 329.
“Prices stopped rising just when the 3060 was launched, so it can’t be a coincidence,” said Driscoll. “It’s not a huge drop, but a significant one. For the increases, I cannot confirm this, but I know that many employers give year-end bonuses in February, and people are starting to file and receive tax returns, which may be driving part of the price increase. ”
Credit: Michael Driscoll
The madness has also been carried over to the latest Radeon graphics cards from AMD. The money changers on eBay are now selling them for about twice the normal cost.
EBay prices have also risen as GPU vendors themselves – such as Asus, EVGA and MSI – have increased prices for new graphics cards thanks to rising component costs and a Trump-era tariff of 25% coming back for certain Chinese imports.
Another possible factor is the increase in cryptocurrency mining, which may be creating more customers for money changers on eBay. Still, imagining someone paying more than $ 2,000 for a single video card confuses us.
In the end, it is a dark time to be a PC builder. To increase your chances of buying a GPU at a regular price, we recommend that you use a free online inventory scanner or check Newegg’s raffle system.