Apple’s iPhone 4S was on sale on Hong Kong’s gray market at the weekend, attracting hundreds of fans paying up to six times official prices to get their hands on the latest model.
The smartphone, released in seven countries worldwide on Friday, was not yet officially for sale in the territory, but dealers had imported them — mainly from Australia and Japan — so that they could resell them to local customers.
The smartphones are retailing for between HK$10,000 and HK$12,000 (between US$1,300 and US$1,500) on the gray market.
Depending on the model’s memory capacity, the iPhone 4S is priced at between US$199 and US$399 in the US with a two-year contract.
“I have sold about 100 iPhone 4S since yesterday,” dealer Ma Hui of Chu Lok Telecom in the bustling Mongkok shopping district said yesterday.
“Several customers bought 10 of them to resell to others,” he said, as he brought the new phones into his shop before opening for business.
However, Ma said that demand for the iPhone 4S was actually more subdued than the frenzy that accompanied the launch of the iPhone 4.
The iPhone 4S will be released for sale in another 22 countries on Oct. 28.
However, dealers in Hong Kong — which has many enthusiastic Apple followers — only expect it to be launched there toward the end of the year.
Hong Kong’s Chinese--language Apple Daily reported yesterday that one customer from the Chinese mainland had spent HK$861,000 on 82 of the new smartphones.
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