NVIDIA's RTX 5090 GPUs Fetch Up to $10,000 on Black Markets as AI Demand Surges in China

NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 5090s Are Being Sold for Up to $5,000 in China's Black Markets, Creating "Crypto-Like" Era Demand

DeepSeek's AI models have reportedly boosted demand for NVIDIA's gaming GPUs in China, as consumers use lineups such as the RTX 50 GPUs to run AI models locally. The ongoing AI frenzy in China doesn't look to stop for now, and with the advent of DeepSeek's R1 AI models, it has seen massive growth. Given that DeepSeek's achievements marked a new era of AI computing for the Chinese market, The Information, citing local smugglers, is now reporting in a paywalled article that the demand for NVIDIA's gaming GPUs, notably the GeForce RTX 5090, has seen a massive rise, given that accessing mainstream AI chips has become almost impossible. DeepSeek's skyrocketing popularity has boosted demand for Nvidia's gaming chips in the underground market as tech firms realize they can run DeepSeek's models at a fraction of the price of AI chips, according to five chip smugglers. - The Information The report claims that individuals in the industry see it much more effective to run DeepSeek models on NVIDIA's consumer GPUs, rather than accelerators like the H20, which has ultimately created massive demand. And, given that China right now has access to "stripped-down" variants like the GeForce RTX 5090D, the demand is enormous that such models are being sold at "black market" prices, with the RTX 5090 reportedly going for up to $5,000, with availability being pretty slim. The demand for NVIDIA's consumer GPUs, particularly the RTX 50 lineup, is at right now, and despite them facing problems like missing ROPs, it seems like the SKUs are an ideal choice for consumers as well as professionals. In addition, DeepSeek has disrupted the global AI market, and its models, notably the R1, are said to provide effective performance with consumer GPUs, leading to Chinese AI firms acquiring models like the RTX 5090, instead of going for pricey AI clusters. NVIDIA has a wide edge over competitors in providing AI computational power through its consumer GPUs, given its high VRAM count and enhanced specifications. In particular, the RTX 5090 features AI TOPS at 3,352 and 5th Gen Tensor Cores, which makes it an ideal replacement for AI accelerators. This is why the demand in China for such GPUs is massive, with NVIDIA being a primary beneficiary.

RTX 5090 cards selling for $5,000 on China's black market as DeepSeek AI models drive demand

In brief: China is in a frenzy to get its hands on the Nvidia RTX 5090 graphics card - but not just because people are desperate for more FPS in their games. The demand is the result of DeepSeek's AI models, which companies realize they can run on Nvidia's consumer GPUs at a fraction of what it would cost them to buy AI accelerators. DeepSeek's industry-disrupting R1 models can efficiently run on consumer GPUs, rather than expensive AI accelerators such as the H20. As reported by The Information (paywalled article), the situation has led to demand for the China-specific RTX 5090D reaching a point where the cards are being sold on the black market for up to $5,000. And even at that price, the chances of finding one are pretty slim. It's not just China where the RTX 5090 and 5090D are being bought for more than 100% of their $2,000 MSRP. eBay.com has several listings for the cards ranging between $5,000 and $10,000, many of which are actaully shipped from China. There are also a number of units from US sellers priced between $2,500 and $5,000. Given the low to non-existent stock levels and the huge demand for the flagship, buying an RTX 5090, or any Blackwell card, directly from a retailer right now is like trying to purchase a card during the height of the pandemic/crypto-boom crisis in 2020 and 2021. While DeepSeek's R1 with its 671 billion parameters is designed for high-performance environments, the company has developed distilled versions of the model that are more accessible for consumer hardware. The 8 billion parameter Llama 8B, for example, recommends a GPU with 21GB of VRAM. Last month, Nvidia and AMD were embroiled in a public argument over which of their respective consumer graphics cards offered better performance when running DeepSeek's AI models. Team Red claimed the 7900 XTX outperformed the RTX 4090, prompting Team Green to release benchmarks showing both the 4090 and RTX 5090 are faster - measured with llama-bench - than AMD's card when using Distill Qwen 7B, Llama 8B, and Qwen 32B.

RTX 5090 scalped for up to $5000 on Chinese black markets, goes for up to $10K on eBay

TL;DR: NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 5090 is in high demand on Chinese black markets, selling for $5000 to $10,000, due to its efficiency in running DeepSeek AI models. Chinese companies prefer these GPUs over more expensive, restricted AI chips. The RTX 5090 offers 32GB GDDR7 memory and advanced AI capabilities, making it a popular choice. Remember the crypto-mining insanity, where trying to buy graphics cards was nigh impossible? Well, NVIDIA's new GeForce RTX 5090 is being sold on Chinese black markets for $5000... with some listings on eBay seeing the RTX 5090 selling for between $5000 and an out-of-this-world $10,000... yeah, $10K for the RTX 5090. The Information reports: "DeepSeek's skyrocketing popularity has boosted demand for NVIDIA's gaming chips in the underground market as tech firms realize they can run DeepSeek's models at a fraction of the price of AI chips, according to five chip smugglers". It looks like Chinese companies have discovered that it's far cheaper running DeepSeek AI models on NVIDIA's consumer-focused GeForce RTX series GPUs rather than more expensive -- and hard, or impossible to get because of US export restrictions -- like the H20, H100, etc. China only has access to "stripped-down" variants of its GPUs like the GeForce RTX 5090D, and that demand is so strong that these models are now being sold at "black market" prices with the RTX 5090 (non-D) selling for up to $5000 or more. Even with missing ROPs, the new NVIDIA GeForce RTX 50 series GPUs are still in insane demand, with the higher-end RTX 5090 being a fantastic choice for AI developers, especially with its huge 32GB of ultra-fast GDDR7 memory. The RTX 5090 features 32GB GDDR7 memory, 3352 AI TOPs of performance, and 5th Gen Tensor Cores... perfect if you want an AI GPU but don't want to spend thousands more on a professional-grade card like the H20.