Sure, I know that.
You do know that "grey market" means "it's in the shadowy area and not necessarily legal", right?
Particularly when the "grey area" email was preceded by one from the same employee saying "there's no way we can buy it legally"?
Nonsense, grey market doesn’t mean shadowy. It means parallel or secondary market. Ebay is full of grey market goods. Buy something on clearance at an authorized retailer and resell it. Buy the inventory of a business shutting down and resell it. You are grey market. No illegal acts have been committed.
If there is no Madagascar Ebony available from the government authorized exporters due to scarecity, you would turn to the grey market to find someone who purchased it legally and buy it from them.
This would be no surprise as I imagine knowledgeable exporting companies might invest in whatever legal ebony becomes available and stockpile it to trade in at profit.