Smartphone dealers in Hong Kong bought iPhone 4S from Australia and Japan and sold them to locals for up to six times the original price.

And Hong Kong buyers did not mind the $1,300 to $1,500 price tag per unit of the latest Apple gadget with one dealer in Mongkok selling 100 iPhone 4S on Saturday, just a day after sales started initially in seven countries, excluding Hong Kong.

"Several customers bought 10 of them to resell to others," Ma Hui of Chu Lok Telecom told AFP.

A mainland Chinese also bought 82 units, as reported by the Chinese-language Apple Daily News.

The iPhone 4S sells for $199 and $399 in the U.S. depending on the size of its memory.

The bloated price in Hong Kong was apparently worth it because the iPhone 4S is not yet for sale in the Chinese territory until later this year or next year. The smartphone will be sold in 22 more countries starting Oct. 28.

Meanwhile, four million iPhone 4S units were sold worldwide from Friday to Sunday, according to Apple senior vice president for worldwide product marketing, Phil Schiller.

In contrast, 1.7 million iPhone 4S was sold last year in the first weekend it became available in stores worldwide.