Reddit photos reignite talk of GeForce RTX 5090 grey market shipments into China
The standard GeForce RTX 5090 is not meant to be sold through official China channels under current US export restrictions, so NVIDIA has leaned on China-specific GeForce RTX 5090D models instead. A later revision, GeForce RTX 5090D V2, was reported with 24GB of GDDR7 and a 384-bit bus as NVIDIA adjusted to changing rules.
The pictures from Reddit show hundreds, possibly thousands, of cards in a large distribution center. There are pallets of cards already in the warehouse, and the boxes appear to be for a single model: the RTX 5090, which should not be available in China.
Source: Reddit
In the Reddit thread, commenters noticed a detail: the boxes shown appear to be dominated by ZOTAC and PNY branding. Some also claimed that marketplace listings in China suspiciously offer just those two brands.
Export controls create a price gap, and that gap attracts middlemen. Gamers Nexus, although their report focused on data-center GPUs, has tracked how GPU export controls and grey-market flows have played out across multiple product generations.
The question is how do board partners not notice when “factory sealed” cards show up where they are not supposed to be sold. MSI faced a similar situation earlier this year and publicly said any GeForce RTX 5090 units appearing in China were parallel imports from unauthorized distribution, with support and warranty risk shifted onto the buyer. Obviously no one buys that.
Source: Reddit
