MSI subsidiary caught scalping RTX 3080 and 3090 GPUs on eBay

With the high demand for the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 and RTX 3090, potential purchasers have felt the sting of Nvidia’s GPU shortage. This has led some to buy graphics cards at higher-than-normal prices. Apparently, it’s also incentivized a seller with close ties to MSI, one of Nvidia’s biggest AIB partners, to scalp the GPUs at significantly high markups.

Starlit Partner, according to MSI, is “an individual sales subsidiary” that works under MSI. Its main goal is to sell off overstock of MSI graphics cards, as well as refurbished units. However, an intrepid Redditor found multiple listings on eBay from Starlit Partner selling MSI’s variant of Nvidia’s brand new GeForce RTX 3080 and GeForce RTX 3090 for almost twice their normal prices.

Starlit Partner listed MSI’s GeForce RTX 3080 GAMING X TRIO at $1359, or $600 over the card’s $759 MSRP. Another listing for the RTX 3090 GAMING X TRIO was selling the card for $2399, or $800 over the normal $1599 price tag. Both of these posts were canceled by Starlit Partner due to “an error in the listing.”

After the issue came to light, MSI released a statement early this morning. The company pointed out that Starlit Partner is a sales subsidiary of MSI that normally sells excess inventory. However, “an error allowed [Starlit Partner] access to inventory they were not permitted to handle,” according to the statement. It is notable that the statement does not explain why Starlit Partner listed the cards at such high markups.

MSI has promised that purchasers can either return the GPU they bought for a full refund or file a claim for a partial refund, which will recover the amount spent that exceeded MSI’s MSRP.

We have reached out to MSI for further comment and will update this article should the company respond.