Corporate domain name management - eBrand Services

Top ccTLD Sales Continue to Grow At Non-.COM’s Expense

Sales of country code Top Level Domain (ccTLD) names continue to grow at the expense of non.COM generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs) an analysis of the top reported domain name sales from 2007 to mid-2010 has shown.

Using Domain Name Journal’s lists of top reported sales for the period to 30 June 2010, sales of ccTLDs have increased from 6.9 per cent of the top 100 sales (sales can total more than 100 due to ties for 100th position) in 2007 to 19 per cent in 2009, while dipping to 15.9 per cent in the first six months of 2010.

However sales of .COM domain names have remained steady hovering around the 80 per cent mark. It is sales of non-.COM gTLDs that are the ones to suffer such as .NET, .ORG and .MOBI. In 2007, non-.COM gTLD sales accounted for 10.8 per cent of the top 100 sales, however this has dropped to 7.7 per cent (2008), three per cent (2009) and then to 3.7 per cent in the first six months of 2010.

This trend would reflect the growing interest in and importance of ccTLD names, in part due to the difficulty to obtain a good .COM name at an affordable price. Another issue that has influenced this is the easing of registration policies for a number of ccTLDs, most notably .FR (France) who in 2010 had the highest selling ccTLD name in the first six months with credit.fr for €587,500 ($851,875).

The two most valuable domain names sold during the three and a half year period occurred in 2008 (fund.com selling for $9,999,950) and 2007 (porn.com for $9.5 million) while toys.com ($5.1m) was the most expensive domain name sold in 2009 and slots.com has been the most expensive domain name sold in the first six months of 2010, selling for $5.5m.

While the prices for the top domain names can depend largely on what is available, it does appear that the global financial crisis did have an impact at least on the top end of the market. The cut-off to make the list of top 100 sales was $100,000 in 2007 and 2008 and $73,500 in 2009. In the first six months of 2010 using the top 50 sales as a guide, the cut-off is $80,000 possibly indicating a recovery in the market.

The above information was based on Domain Name Journal’s lists of top 100 reported domain name sales for the years 2007 to end-of-June 2010.

It should be noted that Domain Name Journal’s sales charts only use publicly reported domain name sales and there may be additional sales that are not made public. There are also sales that include intellectual property apart from the domain name that are also not included.