This is bad news for consumers and is entirely due to the steady drop in value of our Australian dollar in respect to the American dollar. You see, the importing company’s wholesale price is linked to an exchange rate, usually in US dollars or in Euro’s. Back in early September of this year, the Aussie dollar was buying around 93 US cents. Now in December the same Aussie dollar will only buy you around 81 cents. That’s a drop of over 13% in the space of only three-and-a-half -months. So our buying power has just been dealt a savage blow and just as sure as death and taxes, with every significant change of the exchange rate comes the dreaded price rise.

BusiSoft, an Australian importer of brands like Auralic and Audeze has told StereoNET that he expects to raise the retail prices of his equipment “by between 10% and 15% on the 1st of January 2015”.

Mark Döhmann of Telos Audio Distributors says “the Aussie dollar falling sharply over last few months against the major currencies, will impact the retail prices by as much as 10-15% as importation costs rise across the board. Dealers are also predicting there will be flow-on effects in the second hand market, where customers try to sell their gear in order to fund upgrades”.

Greg Osborne from Osborne Loudspeakers, says on his website that “Since we have only increased priced 7% in 13 years, and the dollar dropping by nearly 20%, there will be a 12% price rise across everything we sell as of 1.1.15.“

Our advice to you is that if you are in the market for some new gear, right now might be a smarter time to make that purchase, before the inevitable price increases.

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