Maybe you’ve heard about Chinese Apple stores having a hard time trying to fight against scalpers and smugglers, people who buy dozens of iPhone 4s to resell them in mainland China for hundreds of dollars more. Why? Because there are only 4 Apple Stores in China, and the grey market for Apple products is flourishing over there.
The video below shows these two women in a subway putting a lot of iPhone 4s inside a backpack, getting ready to resell them who knows where. As MicGadget reports, though, importing from Hong Kong is another issue Apple and the local government are facing: the iPhone 4 is cheaper in HK, but you have to pay a tax when importing electronic gadgets to China from HK. These people hide the iPhone in backpacks or tape them to their bodies to avoid to get caught and pay a $149 fine.
Smugglers or scalpers, these ladies sure aren’t up to something good. Importing iPhones form HK may have slowed down, Apple may have created new rules to defeat scalpers, but this is not going to be an easy problem to fix.
