If you want to get a feeling for what the demand may be for Apple’s iPhone X which goes on sale tonight (and which should sell out within minutes) take a look at eBay listings which are offering pre pre-orders. There are over 200 sold X’s ranging from Apple’s list price to a high of $8,400 Buy It Now (not sure why someone would pay this since there are a lot of listings at much lower prices). (Note that I own Apple shares and sold Put options).
While $8,400 is an outlier (the next most expensive iPhone X sold for $6,000) there are large number that sold from $2,500 to $3,000 and there are probably close to 100 listings (many with multiple iPhones) that sold from $1,500 to $2,000. Looking at eBay is an imperfect demand gauge but in checking with a contact who has bought every new iPhone and resold first day shipments it seems like the X has the most activity (and probably the highest prices) since the iPhone 6. The activity and pricing probably isn’t too surprising since multiple analyst surveys have shown strong demand for the X even though it does look like the iPhone 8’s demand has actually been fairly good. If the eBay activity is any indication of the X’s demand it does look like it will be quite strong.
I would not be surprised to see the number of eBay listings increase once the X becomes available and buyers and sellers can guarantee delivery. For now buyers are betting that the sellers will be able to get the X in a timely manner. This is a situation of “buyer beware” since a listing may say that the X will be delivered when the sellers gets it which could be months out into 2018. And there is even a listing where 10 Model X’s with 256GB of memory were sold for $1,050 which is $99 under the $1,149 list price. I’d be very wary of sending money to this seller unless I knew I could get it back.
