Inside the PC Game Gray Market Economy

Jan 20, 2026

Vadim Andreev, CEO of Rokky and former founder of PlayKey, delves into the complex world of the PC games gray market. He explains how regional price arbitrage and promo stockpiling drain publisher margins by 20-40%. Vadim discusses the evolution of digital key resale, highlighting its vulnerabilities and the need for strong defenses like API checks. He also critiques common publisher mistakes and suggests that Valve could enhance control over key exploitation. The conversation combines technology with strategy for a deeper understanding of this hidden economy.

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INSIGHT

Gray Market Is Economic Behavior, Not Just Sites

The PC gray market is an economic behavior exploiting regional pricing and promo timing to siphon publisher revenue.
Vadim estimates 20–40% of publisher margin can leak to resellers without publishers realizing it.

INSIGHT

Two Core Leak Points Drive Large Losses

Price arbitrage and promo stockpiling are the two core leak points driving the gray market.
Vadim quantifies the impact: roughly 20–40% of digital margin can be lost to resellers.

ADVICE

Region Lock Keys Immediately

Do region-lock keys as the first step to prevent cross-border arbitrage.
Check your regional grouping carefully (e.g., separate China and New Zealand from Southeast Asia or Europe).

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The PC games “gray market” isn’t just a couple of shady websites. It’s an economic behavior that exploits regional pricing and promotion timing to siphon revenue away from publishers. In this episode, Our host, Alexandra Takei, Director at Ruckus Games, sits down with Vadim Andreev, CEO of Rokky (and former founder of PlayKey), to unpack how retail-era code resale evolved into today’s global key-arbitrage machine.

Vadim breaks down two core leak points: regional price arbitrage (buying keys in cheaper markets and reselling in premium ones) and promo stockpiling (buying deep-discount keys during sales, then reselling after discounts end). He argues the damage is material: publishers can lose roughly 20 to 40% of margin to resellers, often without realizing how much of their “regional” volume is being cannibalized elsewhere.

The conversation gets practical fast: why region locking is table stakes, how publishers frequently mis-bucket territories (China and New Zealand), and why Steam’s price recommendations can lag real exchange rates and taxes. Rokky’s pitch is a mix of distribution and defense: API-level checks (IP, identity, purchase limits), a key management dashboard, and pricing/promo optimization to close the gaps attackers exploit. The conversation ends with a discussion about Valve and their role in games distribution and the gray market and what they could do to help mitigate the problem.

We’d also like to thank Lightspeed Venture Partners for making this episode possible! With its dedicated gaming & interactive media practice, the firm invests from an over $6.5 billion pool of early and growth-stage capital. If you’re interested in learning more, go to https://gaming.lsvp.com/.

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Sound design by Gavin Mc Cabe.