StockX, a resale website specializing in sneakers, says it has resold nearly 140,000 units of the Sony PlayStation 5, often for hundreds of dollars more than list price. The figure signifies just how difficult it remains to get a PS5 without paying scalpers, but one small victory is that inflated resale prices are slowly coming down as supply of the console improves.
The COVID-19 and bot-wielding scalpers picking shipments clean meant that customers were forced to pounce on online stores the moment a restock was announced, and that situation has far from fully subsided.
The average resale price of the standard $500 PS5 is $800, StockX tells Business Insider, while the $400 PS5 Digital Edition is averaging $741. Across the US, UK, and EU, prices for both models were at their highest during Cyber Weekend 2020 - the days following Black Friday in November - but are now said to be "considerably less than their holiday peak" as Sony is better able to meet demand. StockX's total number of PS5 units sold is troubling, however, as the site reports having sold nearly 140,000 units alone. This paints a picture of the ridiculous scale that the current-gen console scalping situation has reached, and slightly lower prices still aren't anywhere near the retail price that scalpers are paying before fleecing regular customers.
A recent report quotes Sony CFO Hiroki Totoki as saying that supply may not catch up with demand for some time, potentially extending the PS5 shortage through 2022. This could mean another frustrating holiday season, especially as the number of PS5-exclusive games begins to mount, which could again drive would-be players directly into over-charging scalpers' arms. Scalpers have sometimes organized in force, with one high-profile example being a UK group that managed to secure almost 3,500 consoles. Regular customers have only been able to depend on restock alerts delivered via email and social media, and they simple can't compete with bots when it comes to speed without resorting to those methods themselves.
Relieving some of the current shortage tension is a temporary Spider-Man: Miles Morales. The main draw of the system at the moment may simply be improved performance for older games (particularly shorter load times), but the shortage will start to really put a squeeze on Sony, retailers, and legitimate customers when PlayStation 5 exclusives begin to accumulate in Holiday 2021.
Sources: Business Insider
