At the most recent show up here in the NW, the only 7.62x54r was Hungarian LB, 500 rounds for $100. They had taken all of it out of the tins and there was no price break. This same vendor was selling sealed tins of this for about $65 6 months ago, and the larger Czech silvertip tins for the same price some time before that.
And to think that stuff like the Polish used to be $35 or so a tin. Something strange is up, and it cannot just be metal prices or shipping costs. This is an extremely common caliber, and it has tripled in price in less than two years. Millions upon millions of rounds of 7.62x54r are sitting in Europe, waiting for us to buy them, but yet the price goes up and up and up and up, when you can find it, that is. My spidey-sense tells me some unseen hand is manipulating the market.
But, sucker that I am, I pay the 20+ cents per round of decades old corrosive commie surplus just the same.