Since the first week of November, I was helping a friend of mine shop for computer parts to build a new desktop computer since his current one was around nine years old; while helping him shop, the prices of RAM, particularly DDR5 had skyrocketed in such a short duration due to an announcement of wafers being reallocated for AI GPU manufacturing and possibly price fixing by Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron.
For a similarly specced kit of 32GB DDR5 RAM that I bought in March of this year, prices had more than quadrupled in comparison to what I paid by the time Black Friday came.
From the duration of the first week of November to Cyber Monday, I saw prices of kits double. Retailers like Amazon, Newegg, Best Buy likely had bought loads of RAM inventory in advance of the Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, so I didn’t think their costs drastically jumped in that time period, but rather they were all taking advantage of the situation to maximize their profits — I know it’s the right thing for them to do business-wise and for their shareholders, but it’s very scummy towards the consumers IMHO.
Originally, I was aiming for my friend to get a 32GB DDR5 kit, but I had him get a 16GB DDR5 kit instead, so he wouldn’t have pay an exorbitant price between $350-$410; the $16GB DDR5 kit ended up being $130.