YouTuber Doubles Down On Fraud Allegations In Retro Video Game Market
On August 23rd 2021, YouTuber and retro game speedrunner Karl Jobst released a video alleging that auction house Heritage Auctions and grading company WATA Games are colluding in the artificial raising of prices for retro video games. More recently, Jobst has made a video update, delving further into the allegations; this time including the second opinion of attorney Alina Mazeika.
According to Jobst, WATA Games is purposefully valuing their games at unusually high prices in an attempt to boost their income. The games are then offered to Heritage Auctions, which has been selling retro games at record highs as of late. The speedrunner further alleges that very few of the games sold at Heritage Auctions are actually bought by video game collectors, speculating that WATA games is buying up their own video games from the auction house – a practice known as shill bidding.
The original video, called ‘Exposing Fraud And Deception In The Retro Video Game Market’, can be found below:
Heritage Auctions has since released a statement denying the allegations.
"The notion that Heritage somehow colluded in order to achieve results at auction is baseless and falsely assumes that transactions are fictitious when they are in fact very much real,” the press release states.
In Jobst’s latest video, he provides an update on his investigation into WATA Games and some of its key players, suggesting the level of fraud is actually much worse than he initially thought. Backed up by California-based lawyer and fellow YouTuber Alina Mazeika, the new video dives into FTC regulations and the possible grounds for further inspection by the FTC.
“I think we can safely say that Heritage, WATA, and its owners, broke FTC regulations”, Jobst mentions at the end of his latest video.
See his full update below:
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