The high end of the domain market is roaring full steam ahead again. After no sales reached six figures in our last biweekly domain sales report (published March 15) we saw a $380,000 sale of TopHotels.com reported by Sedo Tuesday and today I can tell you that K-Ventures has just sold ECL.com through GoDaddy for $600,000 in the 2nd biggest publicly reported sale year to date (ECL.com and TopHotels.com will both be added to our YTD Top Sales Charts when they are updated with our next bi-weekly sales report that will be out Wednesday evening (March 29). 

While the ECL.com sale has closed we don't yet know who the buyer is as the domain is under WhoIs privacy and, with the nameservers 

Image from Bigstock

yet to be changed, the landing page is a Dan.com notice that the domain is no longer available). However, the seller said he was told the buyer was based in Asia. 

This is the second big 3-letter .com sale for K-Ventures in as many months. In February they posted a $353,000 sale of PFP.com to 9GAG.com.  

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Big Money Sales Back From Brief Break with $380,000 Deal Closed at Sedo

In our latest bi-weekly domain sales report (published March 15), we noted that it was the first report of the new year that had no publicly reported six-figure (or higher) sales to chart. Given all of the global economic issues we are seeing now, some wondered if that meant trouble ahead for top tier domains after their strong start to 2023. We cautioned that one report provided far too little data to draw any meaningful conclusions from and Sedo underscored that today when they announced a $380,000 sale of TopHotels.com.

Image from Bigstock

As of this writing, that ranks as the 3rd highest sale reported so far in 2023 (we will be adding it to our YTD Top Sales Chart in our next report that will be out Wednesday evening, March 29). That trails only Help.com ($3 million at Above.com in January) and another Sedo sale, Giveaway.com at $400,000, last month. It looks the buyer acquired TopHotels.com as an upgrade for their established hotel booking site at TheTopHotels.com as TopHotels.com is now forwarding to that site (it was directed elsewhere prior to the sale). 

We are also hearing about some even bigger sales that have been getting closed under NDAs this month. As the year goes on we will continue to see ups and downs but the value of a strong Internet presence has been proven over and over again in recent years, which in turn has kept demand for quality domains high. While we are on this topic, if you missed it, let me again point you to our new Cover Story in which one of the world's top domain brokers, MediaOptions.com Founder Andrew Rosener, breaks short and long term prospects down in a way that will give you a new understanding of both today's global economic picture and how domains fit into the current and future business climate.

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Radix Take Pride in Premiums, ICANN 76 Concludes in Sunny Cancun & Jimmy Wales is Coming to NamesCon!

I hope you all had a great week and we are wishing you a Happy Saint Patrick's Day! We have a few items to share before heading into the weekend. Radix has released their semi-annual Premium Domains report (.pdf file) covering the second half of 2022. Radix recorded $3.76 million in Total Premium Revenue in H2-2022, bringing their total for the year to approximately $7.6 million - the highest annual total the operator of 10 top level domains has recorded to date.

$2.7 million of that second half revenue came form renewals of premium domains which is a very good sign, indicating buyers of those top tier names were happy with their domains and likely to continue contributing to Radix's annual revenue stream. That is supported by a 5% increase in second-time renewals the company saw in the second half compared to the 1H-2022.

Another interesting detail is that 39% of Premium registrations were 3 characters or less in length. The biggest revenue producers in order were .tech, .online and .store, followed by .space, .site and .fun.

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.ART Weds Web2 with Web3,- Michael Gilmour to Grill Ron Jackson & Ari Goldberger's Wild Ride

The .ART registry, launched in 2017 as part of the ICANN new gTLD program that has brought hundreds of new domain extensions to the Internet, has received a warm welcome from the creative community. Even though .ART is now a permanent and increasingly popular part of the established Domain Name System (DNS), the registry has now launched a new domain initiative of its own - one that allows registrants to have the same name on both the DNS and the decentralized ENS (Ethereum Name Service) favored by Web 3.0 proponents. 

Anyone who has registered a .ART domain can now go to www.Protocol.art and register their matching ENS name so that “theirname.art” will function in both Web2 (DNS) and Web3 worlds. The registry notes that .ART is also collision-proof - only the owner of a DNS .ART 

domain can register the matching ENS .ART domain. Similarly, if an ENS .ART domain is registered for an available DNS .ART domain, only the person who owns the ENS .ART domain can use the DNS .ART domain.

Registry Founder Ulvi Kasimov noted, ".ART is the first domain registry to offer this innovative matching domain capability across both ENS and DNS, making .ART domains more powerful and useful than any other blockchain capable domains. We believe that this will open up new possibilities for artists, collectors, curators, galleries, museums and anyone who wants to express themselves creatively online or on Web3. Our vision is to make .ART domains not only a digital identity but also a digital asset that can be used in various ways on different platforms.”

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Verisign's Final Domain Brief for 2022 Shows Growth Stalled for .Com and .Net but New gTLDs and ccTLDs Rose

Verisign has released their latest quarterly Domain Name Industry Brief, covering the closing quarter of 2022 and wrapping up the past year as a whole. The year ended with 350.4 million domains across all TLDs worldwide. That is up 8.7 million from the end of 2021, representing a growth rate of 2.6%. However, the rate of growth within domain categories varied considerably, running from no growth to double digit gains.

.Com remains, by far, the the dominant TLD on the Internet but its growth rate has stalled in recent quarters. .Com closed 2022 with 160.5 million registrations, down 400,000 from the previous quarter, but up a bit (500,000) from 160 million at the end of 2021 to post a 0.3% increase year over year. 

Verisign operates both .com and .net and the story was similar for .net. The TLD finished 2022 with the same number of registrations it had at the end of the previous quarter, 13.2 million, and actually slipped a tick year over, down 200,000 from the 13.4 million in force at the end of 2021.

The "new" gTLDs, as a group, enjoyed the highest growth rate, 11.1%, but that category is working from a much smaller base. The new G's added 2.7 million domains in 2022 to finish the year with 27.4 million registered worldwide. However, within the group there are big differences between the haves and have nots. The 10 biggest new gTLDs account for over half of all registrations in a group that now has over 1,000 competitors.

The ccTLDs continued to enjoy a healthy growth rate, moving up 4.5% after adding 5.7 million domains to close 2022 with 133.1 million registered worldwide. The country code group, like .com, is working from a much larger existing base which can make it harder to maintain high percentage growth rates. The ccTLD category is 82% of the size of .com while the new gTLDs, at this point,  are just 17% of .com's size.

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Radix Reports Creators Ranging from Solo Entrepreneurs to Major Celebrities Adopting  .Store for eCommerce 

Radix, the operator of top level domains .Store, .Online, .Tech, .Website, .Space, .Press, .Site, .Host, .Fun And .Uno, has earned a reputation as one of the most innovative and effective marketers in the domain industry. In a press release we received today, the company shared results from a 3-month creators.store campaign they launched in November that provided further proof of that. The effort attracted over 7.5 million views across all social platforms in just 90 days. You can see a video that was part of the campaign below:

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After a Tough 2022 Escrow.com Reports Revenue Rebound in Their Latest Domain Name Investment Index 

2022 turned out to be a mixed bag for a lot of companies involved in the buying and selling domains. The common thread was a strong first half, followed by a second half slowdown brought on by a variety of challenges in the global economy that we have talked about at length. That certainly seems to have been the case at Escrow.com who has released their 4Q-2022 Domain Investment Index Report (.pdf rule).

The company reported that their total revenue in Q4-2022 plunged to $80 million after coming in at almost twice that - $158 million - in the same quarter the year before. Over 75% of that decrease came from a plunge in the volume of domain name transactions that Escrow.com handled. Despite the slowdown in 4Q, Escrow.com still had a profitable 2022 after booking $411 million in revenue for the year 

(down 20% from the $514 million taken in for all of 2021). A couple of the key factors Escrow.com cited was a 35% drop in global venture capital funding in 2022 and a corresponding slowdown in the number of sales made at the ultra high end of the market where prices can reach eight figures for one domain.

The good news is that a solid rebound appears to be underway in this new year. In our bi-weekly domain sales reports we have been commenting on the strength we saw in aftermarket sales in January and February. Escrow.com is apparently seeing the same thing as they reported, "February 2023 is shaping up to be the best month since July 2022, possibly June 2022, and we are fairly confident that Gross Payment Volume in 1Q-2023 will be higher than 4Q-22." 

Still there is plenty of ground left to retrace as volume at the company has yet to fully return to the lofty heights reached in 2021 and early 2022. No surprise given that a lot of the economic challenges we mentioned appear to remain a long way from resolution. Even so, seeing the market respond as well as it has against those headwinds in the early going this year is very encouraging in our view.

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2023 Global Domain Report from Sedo & InterNetX Provides Extraordinary Insight Into Industry

Sedo and InterNetX have released their incredibly comprehensive 2023 Global Domain Report. This annual review has always provided an unparalleled look at how the domain industry is faring in every key market around the world but the 74-page report for 2023 has still managed to set a new standard. The especially good news, given the amount of work that obviously went into producing it, is that the report is available free of charge. Just go to domainreport.global, fill in your name, your company name, email address, business type and job role to download. 

The report, that includes commentary from industry pros around the world, breaks down the latest data and developments both

globally and within local markets on every continent.  You will also see how the experts expect the new year to play out. 

Even though there are now over 1,500 TLDs on the Internet, the report manages to distill the latest information in a way that gives you a clear picture of which ones have become the most popular TLDs (covering both gTLDs and ccTLDs). In the aftermarket chapter you'll also find Top 10 lists of public domain sales, median and average values, insight into the performance of the sales channels, and a closer look at rising stars such as .xyz, .io and .ai.

While the annual report is obviously of great interest to players inside the industry, the main reason Sedo and InterNetX put  it together is to draw attention to domains from people who are outside of the industry, as they are the ones who will fuel continued growth. By laying out the details of how well domains have performed in challenging economic times, the report shows domains are stable assets that can provide consistently good returns to those who wisely invest in them. 

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Sedo Rings Big Sale Bell for 2nd Week in a Row with 2nd Highest Domain Sale Reported Year to Date

Just last week Sedo posted what, at the time, was the second highest domain sale reported year to date with PFP.com at $353,000. Today, Sedo pushed that one down a notch to #3 for 2023 by announcing an even bigger one - Giveaway.com at $400,000. As of this writing, the buyer is unknown as the domain is under WhoIs privacy and does not resolve to an active website. 

We will be charting the Giveaway.com and PFP.com sale when our next bi-weekly domain sales report comes out Wednesday evening (March 1). Assuming nothing bigger is reported before then, Sedo will have two of the New Year's three biggest publicly reported sales. Help.com will retain a solid grip on the top spot after selling for $3 million the first week of January at Above.com. 

Image from Bigstock

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GoDaddy Introduces Payable Domains So Any Registrant Can Accept Payments With No Website Required

GoDaddy announced a new "Payable Domains" option today that allows anyone who has a domain registered there to begin accepting payments, whether or not they have a website. The option (that can be enabled through the registrant's GoDaddy back-end dashboard) is available to both new registrants and those with existing domains at GoDaddy. The only cost involved in using Payable Domains will be the transaction fees of 2.3% of the payment amount + 30 cents for each transaction. That compares very favorably to the cost at most other payment processors.

With this move, GoDaddy stated in their press release that they are "the first company to seamlessly bundle payment technology with the brand power of a professional domain – at no additional cost – to help small business owners start growing from day one." Payable Domains, powered by GoDaddy Payments, use branded pay links (incorporating the domain name) that the domain owner can share, allowing the customer to access their secure checkout page with one click. 

For example,  if a person registers the domain of their name or business, such as roohshad.co, they will then receive the corresponding Payable Domain, pay.roohshad.co, to accept payments. Once that first payment is received, domain owners can then link a bank account to their GoDaddy Payments account, complete the verification process, and receive payouts for transactions just as they would with any other payments service. Payments are securely processed with funds deposited into users' bank accounts as early as the next business day. 

In addition, small business owners can customize their Payable Domain with a company logo, product images, cost of their products or services, or other branded content to create a seamless checkout experience and maintain a personal and professional look.

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PFP.com Sold for $353,000 in 2nd Largest Publicly Reported Domain Sale of the New Year

We are continuing to see some nice aftermarket domain sales in these opening weeks of 2023. Today we learned that K-Ventures has completed a $353,000 sale of PFP.com via Sedo. As of this writing, that is the second highest publicly reported sale of the new year to date, trailing only the $3 million sale of Help.com at Above.com in early January (we will be charting the PFP.com sale when our next bi-weekly domain sales report comes out March 1.

The buyer of the domain appears to be 9GAG as PFP.com now redirects to one of their primary sites - Memeland.com. Further evidence of that is 9GAG's purchase of PFP.eth for 40eth on the same day. Congratulations to the seller, buyer and sales venue!

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Three Partners Form Dot UK Group and Make Acquisitions Aimed at Spurring Growth for UK Domains 

The Dot UK Group is a new entity on the domain scene but the three partners who formed it have a wealth of industry experience between them and they have wasted no time making their presence known with a series of acquisitions. The trio includes Ryan Ewen, the CEO of well established domain and website marketplace DigitalCandy.uk, veteran entrepreneur and attorney Jeff Behrendt and fellow domain specialist, Mo Zaffer. 

Ewen told us the group was formed to build a foundation designed to put UK domains back on a fast growth track. Ewen said, "Since 2014 when Nominet (the governing body for UK domain names) released the shorter .uk domain extension with rights of registration ceasing in 2019, there has been confusion between the traditional .co.uk and .uk extensions causing prices to plummet.”

Ewen believes that the services the group has acquired, combined with their experience, will reverse that trend and establish the new group as a major player in the UK domain market. Those acquisitions include:

Ryan Ewen
Co-Founder, Dot UK Group

Brandable.co.uk, a market platform positioned to be the place to buy and sell premium UK domain names. Ewen noted, "At present, existing platforms consider .uk and .co.uk domains as an afterthought – it means that when someone searches for a domain name, UK domains appear way down the list after .xyz, .io and several others, despite the UK market being one of the top countries for online business. As a UK company if you want to rank highly in Google and reduce advertising costs then a premium .co.uk or .uk domain gives credibility to your business."

Flip.uk – Currently Flip is one of the leading auction platforms for UK domain names. Ewen said, "For domain investors the ability to monetize domains and sell them quickly is key to running and growing a portfolio. Currently there are few outlets to achieve this and as a result the overall market is subdued. There will be some new features and a refreshed look which will further enhance the offering."

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.ART Painted a Rosy Picture in 2022 with 39% Jump in Domains Under Management 

Every new year begins with a flood of reports from businesses around the world, summing up how they fared in the previous year. 2022 was one of those years that was a mixed bag with enterprises around the globe having to contend with the negative consequences of a war in Ukraine, inflation, a crypto crash and continuing supply chain issues that created strong headwinds for many. Despite those challenges other still managed to thrive with the .ART domain registry among those who were able to fill the 2022 review (.pdf file) on the registry's official blog with good news.

The report noted, ".ART continues to show strong and steady progress and has remained among the 15 fastest-growing domain name registries, according to data from Hosterstats.com. We ended the 2022 year with 232,307 .ART domains under management, a net domain growth of 39% over 2021. .ART’s consistent and stable growth is evidenced by numerous high-quality registrations, including some of the world’s best-known museums and art institutions, as well as a strong 1st-year renewal rate of 81% for premium names. Individual artists, art enthusiasts, and others associating themselves with “art” continue to be strong supporters of .ART."

Image from Hilbrandbos.art

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One of Europe's Biggest Industry Events - Domain Pulse 2023 - Concluded Today in Switzerland

The biggest domain conference in the DACH region (Germany, Austria and Switzerland), Domain Pulse, completed its 2023 two-day event in Winterthur, Swtizerland today. This show, organized by registry operators SWITCH (.ch), DENIC eG (.de), and nic.at (.at), attracts industry experts, registry and registrar executives and a wide range of other stakeholders. Domain Pulse brings them up to date on the latest developments in the regional and global domain space. 

The Domain Pulse website (English version, German version) already has some photos from this year's event posted, along with full details about the agenda and the speakers who were 

on hand for the conference. Our friends at .it.com, who were among the exhibitors at Domain Pulse, also posted some photos on LinkedIn today, including an opening  day shot  (below) taken when moderator and highly regarded TV reporter Melinda Crane was on stage to welcome attendees.

(Photos courtesy of it.com)

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it.com Concludes Sunrise, Opens Early Access with Price List for 3,000 Premium Domains

it.com domain registry officials were pleased with their Sunrise registration period that ended January 31. Sunrise gives trademark holders an opportunity to secure domains related to their brands before general availability begins. The now open first stage of general availability is an Early Access land rush period, running until February 19, that is spotlighting the short list of domains the registry classified as premium names (only about 3,000 it.com domain were priced at premium levels). 

The administrator of the it.com registry, UK Intis Telecom, put together a priced list (in the standard .csv spreadsheet format) showing all of the premium level domains so anyone can see the exact cost of everything that is available (the prices range from $590 to $7,590 and the renewal cost is at the standard rate, not the 

Image from Bigstock

premium cost). During this stage registrants can also get any of the non-premium domains at standard registration rates (those price are set by the individual registrars).

Munir Badr, Senior Advisor to it.com, said, "We now want to encourage early adopters to choose from a wide variety of available domain names, both premium and general availability, while the going is easy." Registrants can search for available it.com domain names at wee-known registrars including 101domain, MarkMonitor, Marcaria, Nomeasy, CSC Global, Encirca, Key Systems, AEServer, Domgate, and many others. A complete list of accredited it.com registrars is available on the it.com website.

UK Intis Telecom is now embarking on a global campaign to meet as many potential registrants as possible, face to face, by sponsoring or co-sponsoring key conferences and meetings throughout 2023. Those already include these (with others likely to be added):

• 11/1/2022 - Contracted Parties Summit, Los Angeles, CA, US.

• 2/6/2023 - Domain Pulse, Winterthur, Switzerland

• 2/21/2023 - APTLD Meeting 83,  Vientiane, Laos

• 2/27/2023 - Mobile World Congress, Barcelona, Spain

• 3/1/2023 - Affiliate World Dubai, UAE

• 3/11/2023 -  ICANN Community Forum, Cancun, Mexico

• 3/20/2023 -  CloudFest, Europa Park, Germany

• 5/8/2023 - Nordic Domain Days, Stockholm, Sweden

• 5/9/2023 - Middle East DNS Forum, Istanbul, Turkey

• 6/12/2023 - ICANN Policy Forum, Washington DC.

• 10/21/2023 - ICANN General Meeting, Hamburg, Germany

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