They could drop next year too lenses do fluctuate and traditionally after the new year passes sales are much more "flat" as most are burnt out cash wise from Christmas. Some makers have to maintain some lenses price wise esp Canikon their affordable ones don't go up much if at all. It's the more mid range and up lenses that take the bigger hits. Of course the continued weak global market could also help move prices downwards.

The Hong Kong prices tend to be fairly stable if you're ok about grey market (and I am) not a bad place to shop
BTW on Grey market Tamron and Sigma (and other makers) are fooling nobody on this one. Same product, comes from the same factory..it's just their anti competitive price fixing in Europe that drives the grey market. They want to charge more for the same lens and make more profit, simple as that. I for one embrace the grey market giving EU buyers decent prices across a range of lenses

(rant over!)

300 f2.8 was 4299USD in 2006, here. It was raised to 4999USD till last Christmas, the price became 6299. My dealer pushed my to go for the order because price will be much higher than this 6299 next year...so...I double checked with Sony and too sad to learn than it is true and there will also be a revision version after March.

The yen has appreciated by around 50% against the US dollar since the end of 2006 so the yen price of the lens is roughly unchanged over the period. The question now is what might happen to the USD price if the dollar reverses some of its depreciation.

Here are my USA prices for Summer 1985

I'll take a 135mm f/2.8 for $140, please.

Yes, the dollar/yen exchange rate is horrible now, worst in history. It is about $1 = 77 yen. I have been coming to Japan since 1985 and lived in Japan several times so I am always following the exchange rate. We had a nice spike in 2007 when I was here for 3 months and it was $1 = 120 yen, but since has dropped dramatically. My timing for that 3 months was wonderful! I recall that for a short period in 1995 when I was here it got down to $1 = 79 yen for a day or two, but then soon started moving back up. I would be comfortable if it was in the $1 = 100 yen range (which is probably a reasonable average for the last few years) because then prices for many things are more inline with U.S. prices. We are back in Japan now and probably will be for awhile, but the terrible exchange rate means everything costs a lot.

Checking a bit on camera gear recently I saw that with a 100 yen exchange rate prices would be pretty similar to the U.S. for most things, but with the 77 yen exchange rate it makes most stuff very expensive. I do recall a week or so ago seeing a couple of cameras though that even with the terrible exchange rate the prices were lower in dollars than in the U.S. I don't recall what they were, but I was browsing kakaku.com and saw them.

Recently I have read a couple of times predictions that in 2012 the dollar will probably get stronger. I sure hope so -- as long as it doesn't hurt stock prices too much.