A GTA 6 fan going by @AryanBundles on X went viral last week with a bold claim — he had withdrawn his entire 401(k) retirement savings and used the money to pre-order 500 copies of Grand Theft Auto VI, planning to flip them at two to three times the price before Christmas.
The total on the screenshot he shared: $54,720, including 9.45% tax on 500 Ultimate Edition copies at $99.99 each.
The internet erupted. Gaming sites covered it. Finance commentators weighed in. Reddit tore it apart.
And then someone pointed out that the screenshot was not a purchase confirmation at all.
What Bundles Claimed
The post appeared on X shortly after GTA 6 pre-orders went live on June 25. Bundles shared what appeared to be a pre-order screen showing 500 copies, payment via a MasterCard ending in 2439, and a subtotal of $54,720.
“I took a risk in reselling,” he wrote. “I withdrew money from my pension account and pre-ordered 500 copies of GTA VI. This is the most anticipated game of all time, and when it sells out, I’ll be ready to corner the market. This will 2-3x by Christmas.”
The post spread across X, LinkedIn, gaming forums and pop culture subreddits within hours. It racked up thousands of reactions. Coverage appeared on mainstream gaming sites, Pakistani tech blogs, and entertainment outlets alike.
The community response was overwhelmingly one thing: mockery.
Problem 1 — He May Never Have Actually Bought Them
This is the detail most coverage missed entirely, and Reddit spotted it first.
The screenshot Bundles shared was not a purchase confirmation. It was a pre-order checkout screen still asking for a payment method — the kind of screen that appears before you tap the final confirm button.
As one Reddit user put it: “The screenshot looks like it’s before submitting the payment through since it’s still asking for payment method. Who knows if he ever put the order through since it’s not the confirmation of being charged.”
No order confirmation email. No bank transaction screenshot. No follow-up post showing the charge cleared. Just a checkout screen that anyone could stage in about thirty seconds.
Whether the purchase actually went through is completely unverified. Many on Reddit concluded it was either ragebait or a staged screenshot made purely for engagement — possibly by an OnlyFans content creator looking to drive traffic to his page.
Problem 2 — There Is No Disc
Even setting aside whether this was real, the plan has a fatal flaw that many commenters immediately identified.
GTA 6’s physical edition does not contain a disc. It is a retail box with a digital download code inside. Once that code is redeemed, it is permanently tied to the buyer’s PlayStation or Xbox account. It cannot be transferred, gifted, or resold.
Bundles did not buy 500 resellable physical copies of a game. He bought 500 boxes of download codes that anyone can get in unlimited quantities directly from the PlayStation Store or Microsoft Store for $79.99.
“There aren’t discs. He got codes. That are infinite.” — Reddit’s verdict in nine words.
Even the PS5 angle works against him. Millions of PlayStation 5 Digital Edition owners do not have a disc drive at all. His potential buyer pool for any physical box product is already smaller than he assumed.
Problem 3 — GTA V Proves This Never Works
Here is the most damaging historical comparison, and it came from the Reddit thread.
A sealed copy of GTA V — one of the best-selling games in history, with genuine nostalgic value — is worth approximately $30 today after 13 years.
GTA 6 will be produced in even greater quantities than GTA V. It will be available digitally indefinitely. There is no functional scarcity, ever, unless someone specifically needs a physical plastic box as fast as possible and cannot wait for a restock.
The scalper model requires scarcity. GTA 6 is structurally incapable of becoming scarce.
Problem 4 — The Tax Situation Is Even Worse Than You Think
Most coverage mentioned the 401(k) early withdrawal penalty. Fewer mentioned what comes on top of it.
⚠️ 401(k) Early Withdrawal: Withdrawing before age 59½ triggers a 10% IRS penalty plus ordinary income tax on the full amount. On $54,720, that alone could cost $16,000–$22,000 depending on tax bracket. But there is more — selling the copies for a profit would trigger capital gains tax on top of that. Short-term capital gains (assets held under one year) are taxed as ordinary income. He is looking at potentially three separate tax events on one transaction.
The full tax picture in one place:
| Tax Event | Estimated Cost |
|---|---|
| 401(k) early withdrawal penalty (10%) | ~$5,472 |
| Income tax on 401(k) withdrawal | ~$12,038 |
| Short-term capital gains tax on resale profit | Varies |
| eBay / platform fees (12–13%) on all sales | ~$8,500+ |
| Shipping 500 individual game boxes | ~$3,000+ |
| Minimum needed just to break even | ~$83,000+ in total sales |
He would need to sell every single copy at over $166 each before turning a single dollar of profit. On a product with infinite digital supply available at $79.99 from the official store.
What Reddit Actually Said
The r/popculture thread was a graveyard of one-liners, most of them more accurate than the coverage from professional outlets.
“A fool and his money are soon parted.”
“Yeah cause they might run out of digital codes.” — the top sarcastic reply, drilling straight to the core issue.
“A sealed copy of GTA V is worth about $30 after 13 years. This game will be produced in even greater quantity. There is no functional scarcity.”
“The ONE silver lining to digital only — stupid scalpers get wrecked.”
“How do so few people have an ability to detect a joke?” — a fair question, given how far this story spread.
The consensus across the thread was clear: this is almost certainly ragebait, the plan would not work even if real, and the most entertaining part is watching the story spread across outlets that presented it at face value.
Has Anything Like This Ever Worked?
Technically, yes — once, on a GTA game.
During a Steam sale roughly fifteen years ago, Valve sold through their entire allocation of GTA IV digital keys and had to pause sales while waiting for a new batch from Rockstar. People who had keys briefly held something with genuine scarcity value.
But as one commenter correctly noted: that happened because Valve ran out of the keys they had been given to sell. Rockstar did not run out of the game. The keys were a distribution bottleneck, not a supply one. And it lasted hours, not weeks.
GTA 6 in 2026 has no such bottleneck. PlayStation and Xbox handle distribution directly. There is no key allocation that can be exhausted.
Is This Real or Ragebait?
Almost certainly ragebait.
The evidence stacks up cleanly. The screenshot shows a checkout page, not a confirmation. There is no follow-up purchase proof. The account appears to be a content creator. The story is almost too perfectly calibrated to generate outrage — the retirement fund detail, the specific number of copies, the confident 2-3x prediction.
Real or not, it worked. The story generated massive organic reach across every platform it touched, and the account behind it got exactly the attention it was looking for.
Whether Bundles spent $54,720 or spent five minutes staging a screenshot, the result is the same: a viral moment built on GTA 6’s cultural gravity doing the heavy lifting.
The Lesson
GTA 6 is the most anticipated game in years. Pre-orders crossed $3 billion within days of going live on June 25. The hype is real. The demand is genuine.
But hype is not the same as scarcity. And a digital download code in a cardboard box is not an investment asset.
If you want to be part of the GTA 6 launch, buy one copy, at the best available price, from a reputable retailer. Your retirement fund will thank you.