Why do Apple buy (Trade-In) their own product cheap and sells it expensive out in the market?

Their partner, BrightStar, is a for-profit recycler, just like Gazelle.com and other companies that buy used consumer products and re-sell them or recycle them for materials. These companies are businesses that have to build in profit for themselves in every offer they make to someone selling or trading in their device.

You will never get near to used retail prices for your used devices from a for-profit reseller or recycler. They cannot function as a business if they do that.

Yeah, I think what people have no clue of is that Apple’s partner in distribution, buy-back and recycling, BrightStar Corp., is a 9k+ employee, $10B annual revenue privately held company that services several hundred carriers in some 100 odd countries. BrightStar is in that business for the money, not to give consumers back their personal investment in the products they used.

AppleParker wrote:

Why do Apple buy (Trade-In) their own product cheap and sells it expensive out in the market?

It's called "Capitalism".

That's just the way they operate. That's not much different than selling a used car to a dealer. They're primarily working through a trade-in partner. I'm guessing some of these trade-ins go into their repair/replacement service.