PlayStation 4 Nearly Impossible to Find

Checking at website nowinstock.com, only two bundles appear to be available and those only at Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT). The bundles cost $517 and $519, well above the $399 list price for the PS4. But at least Walmart has some.

Best Buy Co. Inc. (NYSE: BBY), GameStop Corp. (NYSE: GME), Target Corp. (NYSE: TGT), and Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) are all shown to be out of stock. No stores have the console available for sale by itself. Amazon is taking pre-orders for the PS4.

If you don’t want to wait, there are consoles available at EBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) for $525 and up.

Fergal Gara, head Sony’s PlayStation business in the U.K. and Ireland, told U.K. website mcvuk.com:

PS4 pre-orders were obviously a strong indicator of what was going to happen, but they were so big that we were pinching ourselves and wondering if people were pre-ordering in more than one place, and if some of these pre-orders were real. We were getting numbers we never imagined, let alone seen before. But it proved to be real.

Gara also said that he thinks supplies may be sketchy until April.

None of this can be welcome news for Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT). Its new Xbox One console is listed as in-stock at all retailers surveyed. The new console’s list price is $499 and only the Microsoft Store is show to be out-of-stock. There’s irony for you.