A sudden surge in used smartphone sales last month after Apple raised the price of its iPhones reveals how the weak yen and shifts in communication industry practices are reshaping Â鶹´«Ã½ consumer market for popular handsets.
Nicosuma, an online marketplace for used smartphones, saw a rush of sales just hours after Apple¡¯s announcement on July 18, with orders more than doubling as of noon compared to the same period the previous day and a week earlier.?
¡°Such a spike is quite rare,¡± said Yu Tomita, chief marketing officer at Tokyo-based Belong, the operator of Nicosuma and a subsidiary of major trading house Itochu. ¡°The only comparable case we can think of is the iPhone price hike four years ago.¡±
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