“Lured by the promise of profit from smuggling the new iPhones into China, opportunists joined the thousands of Apple Inc fans lining up to buy the devices as they were launched on Friday across Asia,” Theodora D’Cruz And Yuya Shino report for Reuters.
“Regulatory hurdles mean the iPhone 6 and the larger iPhone 6 Plus won’t be available soon in China, the world’s biggest smartphone market where Apple products are popular,” D’Cruz and Shino report. “Benefitting from the delay were many people in Singapore, Hong Kong and Australia, who said they were buying as many iPhones as they could specifically for resale in China.”
“The delay had given smugglers reason to cheer, with many Hong Kong residents racing to pre-order the phone online,” D’Cruz and Shino report. “Such is the appeal of the iPhone in China that in Singapore, several people said they were getting paid to queue up to buy the devices with the intent of reselling them to dealers.”
Read more in the full article here.
Related articles:
iPhone 6/Plus queues far larger than for iPhone 5/5s launches – September 19, 2014
Mother of all upgrades: Huge crowds greet Apple’s new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus – September 19, 2014
Apple’s iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus debuts worldwide to long lines – September 19, 2014
Gold iPhone 6 Plus price hits $3,600 in China as delay fuels black market – September 18, 2014
Even if I was a billionaire I can’t see paying massively over the odds for something that will be widely available in a relatively short period of time. Amazing what some people will do.
Samsung smugglers caught throwing Samsung Notes overboard, keeping stylus for eating utensil
I witnessed this first hand today. I estimate that 50% of the people in the line were from Asia. They were all buying fully unlocked for quick shipment for profit. One was aggressive enough to walk the line offering a 128G Plus that they just got for $1800. No takers. I also noticed that the overnight sleepers were exceptionally disgusting this year. Basically, left piles of trash behind.
There were more chinks at Apple Store Georgetown than in my transsexual wife’s weave.
That is disgusting. You should be ashamed of yourself.
The line I queued up in overnight was full of young Asians that were all doing the same thing. I was about 12th in line and when I woke up in the morning I was about 30th. Queue jumping was taken to a whole other level and Apple should have been all over this. When we got ushered up the Apple Store all these young Asians were ordering two lots of iPhones. By the time they got to me Apple ran out of the iPhone Plus. I can’t believe I lined up overnight in -4 degree weather for nothing. I decided to walk over to the Telstra store and take my chances there as they restrict customers to one device. I go the last Gold 128gb iPhone Plus. That made up for the earlier debacle.
I should also add that there were three young Caucasian males in line and between them were two young Asian girls. In the morning the girls were joined by about 5 of their friends. The youngster guys were pissed off as you can imagine and when they confronted one of the girls she played the I don’t speak English card.