Plarail price increasing

I noticed on sites like ebay, the price on Plarail engines are now in the $25-$40 range at cheapest, does this mean it's the end of Plarail Thomas altogether? I also noticed the increase in other items. Could COVID-19 be causing this to happen?

[Super]

Could be world events causing anything now a days but I wouldn't use Ebay as an indicator of Plarails price for their items. Best to use a site from Japan to judge how much the average price is for a train. But this doesn't mean that their prices haven't gone up, in fact it does look like they may have gone up a bit but that may have to do with the cost of materials, manufacturing, labor and inflation. It does look like trains that went for $18 & 18 dollars are now going for $20 & 21.

Best to use a site from Japan

Specifically Yahoo Auctions.
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All vintage Plarails costs are drastically increasing as of March this year. Expect to pay around 20%-450% more the original expected prices from now. The original expected prices are found in Mandarake's Plarail buying cost table although very outdated.
Of course the 3 types of vehicles in 1 set are increasing too, especially Nagoya Railway Set.

Yes shipping from Japan has also gone through the roof too!!!
Some eBay sellers who once offered free shipping have bumped up shipping prices from 0-$250, with some even as high as $2000 for a $50 item...
Don’t really know what’s going on, but it is CRAZY!!!!

DHL to other SEA countries outside Japan to ship a 3 car box is around 5800 yen now. I live in Japan, so my shipping costs is 1000 yen flat for these boxes... above average the price.

[Super]

 with some even as high as $2000 for a $50 item..

What??? Wow, I haven't seen that but then again I haven't been browsing too much in the train category lately. Wait...Is that Yen or Dollars?

It should be yen, shipping should be less than 100 USD by all means.

Here is Just a couple...

Dollars $ Vio

It looks like I'll have to buy from Amazon Japan instead on most of them.