TECH NEWS – Two of the most powerful Blackwell architecture graphics cards are simply not being sold to tourists in the Asian island nation!
It seems that GPU resellers are trying their hardest to get their hands on Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 5090s, and in light of this, a local retailer in Japan has introduced an interesting sales restriction. The inventory situation for the RTX 5000 series is not looking too good, with most models (especially the higher-end ones) either sold out or available at absurd prices. In Asia, several retailers in several countries have the flagship Blackwell cards on the shelves, probably due to the relatively low demand in the region, and this seems to have prompted tourists to fly into the country to get their hands on a copy. In Malaysia, for example, if you walked into one of the country’s biggest tech shopping malls, you’d be able to find one in no time, and it wouldn’t have a horrendous price tag (at least compared to the situation here).
This has frustrated Japanese retailers, who have now come up with a move to stop high-end graphics cards being sold to tourists altogether. A stern warning has been placed under retail shelves stating that the GeForce RTX 5090/RTX 5080 will not be sold to people outside of Japan. Initially, it was claimed that retailers were blocking tax-free purchases because they were primarily aimed at tourists, but that didn’t really pan out. From now on, tourists will have to fill out a Japanese residency test at the checkout to determine if they are tourists or legal domestic buyers. This, however, can be tricked.
However, looking at the situation in the Japanese retail GPU market, it seems that many resellers enter the country only to sell GPUs at a higher price after exporting them… This move seems a bit odd, but it should be appreciated as Japanese retailers want the cards to go to the original consumers, not the scalpers.
Since the demand for Nvidia’s consumer GPUs is quite high worldwide (including China), some people are trying to get cards by any means necessary to make a killing on them, exploiting the average consumer…
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