What you need to know
- Apple has stopped selling products in Russia.
- Third-party retailers that are still offering Apple's goods are battling crippling sanctions and inflation.
- This has caused prices to skyrocket across Apple's product range.
While Apple may have stopped the sale of products in Russia in response to its invasion of Ukraine, third-party retailers still offering its goods have massively increased prices to battle sanctions and inflation.
As reported by Russian outlet iPhones.ru:
Some time after Apple's announcement of the temporary suspension of sales of its equipment in Russia, non-chain stores and individual sellers sharply raised prices.
The outlet notes that prices have soared "almost everywhere", and that it's having a staggering impact on the cost of buying Apple products in the country.
The starkest example is Apple's most expensive MacBook Pro, which now reportedly costs over 1 million rubles to buy, almost $10,000. The most expensive iPhone 13 Pro Max (1TB) is now being sold for 308,679 rubles, almost exactly $2,700. The cheapest iPhone 13, the mini, is now more than $800.
The Apple Watch Series 7 is now as much as $1,750 for the most expensive model, and the most expensive M1 iPad Pro (2021) (12.9-inch 2TB) is more than $3,000.
Due to sweeping sanctions imposed as a result of Russia's aggression in Ukraine, the value of the ruble plunged by some 26% and was at one point worth less than 1 U.S. cent earlier this week.
As noted, Apple has stopped selling its products in the country. Furthermore, it has stopped exports into its sales channels, has limited Apple Pay and other services, and has taken state-sponsored networks RT news and Sputnik out of its App Store. It has also disabled traffic and live incidents from maps in Ukraine "as a safety and precautionary measure for Ukrainian citizens."
