I saw an Asian Wall Street Journal best buy information box graphic (called Arbitrage, I think), on Friday 28-Sep-2001.

It listed the price of a new M6TTL chrome in various Asian cities (captioned 'price at major centrally located discount retailer'). Prices from HK to Tokyo listed at $1550 to $2000, but for Bangkok the price was only $1100!

Can anyone supply any more information on Leica prices in Bangkok? Sounds too good to be true, though I know that prices in BKK are very low for some stuff. ProviaF goes for around $4 a roll, but we are talking M bodies here...

-- Mani Sitaraman (bindumani@pacific.net.sg), September 30, 2001

Answers

Maybe we could do a bulk buy!

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), October 01, 2001.

I'll say! I seriously doubt that it's for real though.

-- Josh Root (rootj@att.net), October 01, 2001.

I've emailed a Bangkok correspondent to LUG. Let's see... I'm kicking myself, because I was there 4 weeks ago, and stopped by a pro-shop dealer to get film...Unlikely I'll be returning anytime soon.

-- Mani Sitaraman (bindumani@pacific.net.sg), October 01, 2001.

Theres a saying, if it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is. I'd be cautious about it at those prices. But then maybe those are the real prices to actually manufacture a Leica without forking for the Leica brand name and little red dot. Or its a shipment off the back of a truck...christmas is nearing so Santas a giving, yippee..

-- (sparkie@mailcity.com), October 01, 2001.

Often differences in prices on the international market reflect currency exchanges more than anything else. Has the money there taken a recent nose dive?

-- Andrew Schank (aschank@flash.net), October 01, 2001.

Real information from Khun Salanai, my LUG correspondent:

"I just check price of brand new M6 TTL. It's around 69,000 Bath (U$D 1,500) and A shop in Thailand import it from Hongkong. Best regards P.S. I think U$D 1,100 is a used M6 TTL' price."

So it was too good to be true.

-- Mani Sitaraman (bindumani@pacific.net.sg), October 01, 2001.

Mani, the prices for a new M6TTL in Hong Kong (Grey) is about 11,500 HK dollars, which is about £1010 UKP or $1482 USD. So it sounds about right, and still cheaper than US prices by a little. How much does it cost to get a M6TTL 0.58 in Singapore btw? Cheers,

-- sparkie (sparkie@mailcity.com), October 02, 2001.

Hi guys, I'm a Leica user living in BKK. I checked with an authorized dealer here and the price of .85TTL is Bt79,900. For 0.58TTL, it's Bt81,000. At the current exchange rate of Bt44.7/USD, the HiMag is c.USD1,790, and the new 0.58 is c.USD1820. Jebsen (the local distributor) will support their products for two years.

I hope this is useful for y'all Yuth

-- Yuthapol Laplamool (nuchyut@asianet.co.th), October 05, 2001.