Laws of supply and demand do their work.
Laws of supply and demand do their work.
Prices of Sony's Playstation 3 have jumped to nearly US$4,000 on Ebay after the gaming console was launched in the US.
Half a day after the devices went on sale, Ebay reported that close to 800 PS3 systems had sold that day at an average price of US$2,716.59.
Sony is launching two models of its next generation gaming console: A 20GB version sells at $500 while a 60GB model is available at US$600. Games go for US$60 each.
Sony started sales of its next generation gaming console at midnight on Thursday, five days after the console launched in Japan.
The console maker made 100,000 systems available in Japan. The 400,000 units that are available for the US are expected to sell out within the first days.
The scarcity of the system caused long lines outside stores, with some eager buyers camping out for days to guarantee that they would get one of the coveted systems. A mad midnight rush on store shelves caused authorities to shut down a Wal-Mart store in California and caused injuries at a store in Wisconsin, according to an Associated Press report.
The spiking demand and limited supply gave rise to a flourishing market for PS3 systems on the Ebay auctioning site. By Friday morning US time the gaming consoles were selling for more than US$2,500. Sellers offering free overnight shipping and bundled games in some cases saw bids of more than US$3,850.
Numerous sellers asked up to US$15,000 for their consoles, but failed to attract any bids.
High profile auctions like these also tend to attract hoax bids from Ebayers who have no intention to pay. One buyer bidding more than US$8,000 had no past Ebay buying history. He outbid several other Ebayers without a bidding history who had only recently signed up for an account with the online auction site.
To battle fraud by sellers, Ebay has put restrictions in place for listings of the new gaming console. Sellers are required to prove that they have the unit in their possession by posting a picture of the device with the user's screen name inside the photograph. They also have to post an image of the sales receipt.
The auction site had even stricter requirements for presales, demanding that sellers have a 98 per cent positive feedback ratio from at least 50 past deals.
The trend in PS3 sales is largely similar to what happened last year when Microsoft started shipping its Xbox 360. The Microsoft consoles brought in about US$3,000 in the hours after the launch. Prices later subsided around the US$800 level.
Sony's Playstation 3 is the second of the next generation gaming consoles to start selling, following the November 2005 launch of Microsoft's Xbox360. The PS3 is slated for release in Europe next March.
Nintendo is preparing to start shipping its Wii console on Sunday 19 November in the US and in Europe on 8 December.