False gold bars may also be sold on Ebay

The issue of Ebay has become a collection of court decisions. An interesting decision is currently being made by the District Court of Augsburg, which is referring to an auction called “Gold barren 1 OZ (UNZE) Credit Suisse – bars in the blister” and the description “I have taken this information from the blister. The bar was not taken out of the blister. Therefore, the authenticity has not been verified. I sell it as a fake. Only make or buy bids if they agree to them.” had to decide whether the buyer could withdraw or contest the auction if it was determined after the purchase that it was not real gold.

The buyer remained the highest bidder with a bid of 1,060 euros. He argues that under eBay’s terms, the seller was not allowed to offer the ingots at all because it was a replica.

The district court dismissed the action on the court, since it is not possible to declaim a deception in the comprehensive assessment of the description of the article. In the description there is the note that the bar has not been tested for authenticity and in large highlighted letters the note “I sell it as unauthentic“. In the overall view, the General Court therefore took the view that the authenticity of the ingot was questionable on the basis of the description and that this was sufficiently expressed in the description of the article.

The appeal against the judgment of the district court was rejected as unfounded by the district court. The judgment of the district court of 19.12.2018 is therefore final.

Author: Marian Härtel

Marian Härtel ist Rechtsanwalt und Fachanwalt für IT-Recht mit einer über 25-jährigen Erfahrung als Unternehmer und Berater in den Bereichen Games, E-Sport, Blockchain, SaaS und Künstliche Intelligenz. Seine Beratungsschwerpunkte umfassen neben dem IT-Recht insbesondere das Urheberrecht, Medienrecht sowie Wettbewerbsrecht. Er betreut schwerpunktmäßig Start-ups, Agenturen und Influencer, die er in strategischen Fragen, komplexen Vertragsangelegenheiten sowie bei Investitionsprojekten begleitet. Dabei zeichnet sich seine Beratung durch einen interdisziplinären Ansatz aus, der juristische Expertise und langjährige unternehmerische Erfahrung miteinander verbindet. Ziel seiner Tätigkeit ist stets, Mandanten praxisorientierte Lösungen anzubieten und rechtlich fundierte Unterstützung bei der Umsetzung innovativer Geschäftsmodelle zu gewährleisten.