The action was fast and furious at the Games yesterday, and that was just outside the Olympic Green, where buyers and sellers were mixing it up.

"What you need, mate?" barked a balding British man wearing sunglasses with a handful of tickets. He was clearly in his element, just another day at the office.

"What do you have?" came the answer from a small group of hopeful sports fans who had gathered outside the last subway station before entering the Green.

"Swimming?"

"Today?"

"You got two?"

"I can get, wait."

The conversations here are quick and to the point, conducted in broken English and fractured Mandarin.

If you had wanted to see Michael Phelps win his third gold medal, you could have bought tickets less than two hours before the session began. But a 200 yuan ($29) ticket would have set you back 5,000 yuan ($730).

Scalping, or ticket touting, is officially illegal in China, but a nearby policeman said only if the mark-up was excessive.

"A little profit is okay," he said, without going into detail.

Capitalism and China seem to work well together.

Some bet that prices would fall as the sessions drew near, but they also found themselves still on the outside of the Olympic Green.

"We were offered today's waterpolo tickets for 150 yuan yesterday," said John Brenner, an American student living in Beijing, talking about 30-yuan face value tickets.

"They are 200 today!" he said, somewhat mystified that his strategy had backfired. And that was for an event that had already started.

A near seven-times mark-up for an event that is already under way?

"If you don't want 'em, you don't have to buy 'em," explained another apparent professional who seemed to be working with the bald man.

Many were only selling two tickets that they had bought themselves and were only looking for a modest return.

You could still buy two 800-yuan tickets for only a 100 per cent mark-up to the track and field finals on August 21.

"Sure, you got tickets," said Anna Malkan, a Swedish student who would only pay for "reasonable" tickets.

"The most I've paid is double," she said proudly. "I usually pay only face value."