eBay Max Bid Corrupt?? Can others find it out?

You need to look on the bid history page - did someone bid a higher amount, and then retract it? If so, when they bid over you, their current bid showing would let them surmise what your bid is (since their bid showing on the listing page would be one bid increment over yours at that point).

Then if they retract the bid, and claim "Bid wrong amount", then bid just UNDER your bid, your winning bid would be pushed up to the max.

To avoid this - only place your bid in the last few minutes of the auction. That way it's not sitting there to be shilled, or for some newbie who can't figure out what they want to pay, to "nibble up", by bidding higher and higher amounts in small increments (which they would not be doing if your higher bid were not there)

Sometime, though, it's just luck. Often two or more people value the item at the same amount of money. When the bids are within a bidding increment of each other, then that's just the way it works out.

The highest bid wins the item, irrespective of when it's placed. In your eg the sniper wins simply because he bid more. The fact he bid in the last few seconds only means you lost out in the last few seconds. If the sniper had also bid $80 at the last second, because you bid your maximum bid earlier, it will be your $80 bid that wins. Personally, sniping is pointless in my opinion. I bid my max bid up front and that's it. I don't bid "bit by bit". Put your best bid in up front and hope! If your bid is lodged, it will be used in the auction, you won't find the auction ends before the ebay system uses your bid!

Yeah, I have experienced the very same thing and it can't be just coincidence. I doubt ebay has bots to jack up profits but I wouldn't rule out a method that lets people look at the PHP scripting.