i wasn't aware that using paypal is a viable method to get around such a block. my bank called me the other day about a charge i made and they called out the merchant so i think providers know who is the merchant even if you use paypal.
I dont undrstated what type of block you have, but I googled some stats and American buyers are ranked 4th on Aliexpress, after Brazil, Russia and Spain.
Aliexpress is half of Amazon [and amazon is HUGE], having 250Billion market cap vs 450Billion for Amazon
Its a legit web site and competes with the big boys, also it accepts everything like paypal, CC and regional payments..
They have disputes department and it works, im kind of big buyer there lol got Platinum rank the highest they have, so im dealing with disputes rather often.
For me I prefer Amazon of course, but Amazon is doing everything by the books, so if i buy over 75USD, they charge me import tax. But amazon has great returns and i dont pay for shipping to Israel if i buy over 49USD [for amazon own products]
But on aliexpress they have many things amazon dont [especially small things like cables, connectors, strange electronics, they have engineering sample CPUs you can buy good CPU for 1/4th of price and so on] , also i can talk to merchnats and if i buy soemthing expensive like
Nano Plus, they shipped it to me as 20$ value Toy RC, i didnt pay a cent for shipping nor import tax or VAT
If i got my Nano from amazon i would pay about 200USD if not more to the goverment [which i hate doing], 17% VAT and some sort of import tax