Just now, Guangzhou Customs conducted a court auction on JINGDONG, one of the largest online retailers in China, for hundreds of consoles that had been seized for non-payment of the customs duties.
Currently, Guangzhou Customs has not disclosed more detailed information about how they found and seized the smuggled consoles. According to JINGDONG's online auction page, there are a total of 280 Switches, 24 PS5s and over 230 Switch cartridges. The starting price of this court auction is 60,000 USD. Due to the previous massive malicious bidding violations Chinese customs encountered when auctioning Yugioh’s Blue-Eyes White Dragon 20th Anniversary Gold Edition Card, participants in the auction must pay a security deposit of $12,000 in advance.
Actually, this is not the first case of game smuggling uncovered in recent years. With the introduction of video game age restriction mandates in China over the last two years, the Chinese government has tightened its regulation of the video game market. Vendors of video game discs and stores selling consoles are also under greater scrutiny. As a result, the sale of these goods is often conducted under cover of darkness, with more smuggling and gray market dealings.