Graphics card prices in China are expected to see another increase later this month, with manufacturers reportedly planning to raise costs for both Nvidia and AMD cards. This potential rise could have ripple effects on global pricing for GPUs.

Asus is said to be increasing the price of its RTX 5070 cards by approximately $22 to $45 in mainland China. Gigabyte has reportedly already adjusted prices upward for its RTX 5060 Ti 16GB GPU by about $30. AMD has also seen price hikes across several models, including the RX 9070 XT, the RX 9060 XT (both 16GB and 8GB versions), and the RX 7650 GRE, with increases ranging from approximately $30 to $60.

These adjustments follow earlier reports from July indicating AMD's intention to increase prices for its GPU and VRAM partner bundles by 10%. The ongoing memory supply crisis is cited as a contributing factor to these price changes. Furthermore, Nvidia has been actively reducing its gaming GPU production, with recent reports suggesting a trimmed shipping forecast of 15% to 20%.

This shift in production is widely assumed to be a move towards manufacturing more AI GPUs. Nvidia's data center segment achieved significant revenue, reporting $89 billion in the last quarter alone, and the company recently announced a substantial $13 billion acquisition of AI development platform Hugging Face. The prioritization of AI hardware is likely driven by the higher profit margins offered by the professional segment compared to consumer GeForce graphics cards.

However, the production landscape might be more complex. Some industry insights suggest that Nvidia is not necessarily producing fewer 4nm GB20x Blackwell chips but is reallocating its existing stock towards the professional market. These Blackwell chips are finding their way into enterprise products rather than new consumer GeForce cards. The demand for GPUs in AI development, such as their reported use in training large language models, further underscores the demand in the professional sphere.

For consumers, this strategic reallocation by Nvidia, driven by market assessments and profit potential, means a continued squeeze on supply for new GeForce cards. The result is likely to be sustained higher prices for gaming-oriented GPUs, making acquiring the latest hardware a potentially costly endeavor.