As already highlighted above, the illicit cigarette market comprises of many different brands. It is thus not surprising that illicit brands exhibit as ETB15 per pack to as high as ETB120 per pack in 20217. This translates into a spread of ETB105 per pack. pack to ETB236 per pack. The spread had also widened to roughly It is important though to consider not just average prices and ranges, illicit volumes on average during the 2021 - 2025 YTD period. bound of the illicit brand price range. This suggests the following: · Almost half of illicit market volumes (and possibly an even larger share) are sold at low prices. · Keeping prices near the lower bound of the range could signal a strategy to maintain or expand market share in the illicit market. Mengesha, S. & Ross, H. (2024) also reported wide spreads of ilicit prices. More specifically, illcit stick prices was reported as ranging from ETB1.92 (ETB38 per pack) to ETB8.00 (ETB160 per pack) in 2022, with the spread equal to ETB122 per pack. These prices are roughly aligned with those reported by NTE for 2023 - ranging from ETB33 per pack to ETB174 per pack