Due to the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, important products in the gaming scene are in short supply. This applies to consoles and PC parts, like Nvidia's RTX 3080. It's so bad that Nvidia has said 3080 and 3090 shortages will continue into next year.
Because of this, many are willing to pay a high price for the graphics card, and it is expensive. The typical price for a GeForce RTX 3080 is around $750 where available. Tech outlets like MSI are still offering them, as are online shopping sites. However, some companies are doing more with the RTX than just selling them at base price. One particularly sinister development was discovered on eBay not long ago.
The story starts with an eBay listing for the 3080 under a company called Starlit Partner. Starlit was selling the 3080 for a hugely marked up amount, around twice the regular price. This drew the attention and ire of some players and tech followers. Several brought to light the troubling fact that Starlit is actually a subsidiary of MSI. MSI is a proprietor of tech often used for gaming, like the GE66 Raider, so graphics cards are big money for it. Based on the evidence, it looks like MSI was scalping its own graphics cards on eBay.
At first, Starlit's actions could have been written off as regular price scalping. This is usually the domain of single buyers rather than companies, but it's not impossible. Players have already endured console price scalping as part of the PS5 and Series X's meme-worthy pre-order chaos. However, it was soon discovered that Starlit is a subsidiary of MSI, which already had 3080s to sell. Many soon drew the conclusion that MSI gave its own in-stock 3080s to Starlit to sell at inflated prices on eBay, thus scalping its own merchandise.
After this was pointed out, the 3080s were quickly pulled from the store, and MSI did give an official response. The company stated that Starlit is a subsidiary of MSI that sells its excess inventory or used items. Neither of these is the case for the 3080s in question, and apparently it was an "error" that caused Starlit to have access to the 3080s to sell. The exact nature of the error is not made clear, but it would have to be a slip up equal to Nvidia leaking customer information at least.
It seems that MSI will not be castigating Starlit and, though it says steps will be taken to avoid similar situations, those steps are also not made clear. Many on Reddit and Twitter do not believe that there was an error, and that this was an intentional move by MSI, but that can't be proven. Players have taken action against Nvidia scalpers before, and bringing this to light was not so different. In a year when prices are high, supplies are short, and wallets are tight, customers have to look out for each other.