Major .com price hikes could be coming.
The U.S. Government has extended its Cooperative Agreement with Verisign (NASDAQ: VRSN) for managing the .com domain name. The deal will allow Verisign to negotiate with ICANN to raise the price of .com by 7% in each of the last four years of each six-year .com contract.
Verisign released this statement:
Amendment 35 provides Verisign the pricing flexibility to change its . com Registry Agreement with ICANN to increase wholesale price for . com domain names. Specifically, the flexibility permits Verisign to pursue with ICANN an up to 7% percent increase in the price for . com domain names, in each of the last four years of each six-year period of the . com Registry Agreement. Amendment 35 clarifies that the vertical integration restrictions on Verisign’s ability to own an ICANN-accredited registrar apply only to the . com registry and not to other services offered by Verisign, and the .com Registry Agreement can be amended to reflect that. Amendment 35 also identifies the circumstances that require approval by the DOC for further changes to the .com Registry Agreement, extends the expiration of the Cooperative Agreement to November 30, 2024, and provides for the automatic renewal of the Cooperative Agreement for six-year terms unless the DOC provides Verisign with written notice of non-renewal 120 days prior to the end of the then-current term. Finally, Amendment 35 confirms that Verisign will operate the . com registry in a content neutral manner with a commitment to participate in ICANN processes.
In the amendment, the U.S. Department of Commerce stated that ccTLDs, new gTLDs and social media “have created a more dynamic DNS marketplace”, and as such, it’s appropriate for Verisign to have pricing flexibility.
Price hikes can’t begin for two years from now. Verisign will still have to get ICANN’s approval for any price hikes, but ICANN has previously acquiesced. ICANN is likely to grant price hikes in return for a higher cut of the action.
The full amendment is here (pdf).
The Department of Commerce billed the changes as reducing regulatory burdens in line with Trump’s policies, and took a stab at the Obama Administration for freezing .com prices:
NTIA and Verisign have agreed to extend and modify the Cooperative Agreement. These modifications are in line with policy priorities of the Trump Administration. The changes create a new commitment to content neutrality in the Domain Name System (DNS), provide market-based pricing flexibility, and reduce the regulatory burden on Verisign.
Amendment 35 confirms that Verisign will operate the .com registry in a content neutral manner with a commitment to participate in ICANN processes. To that end, NTIA looks forward to working with Verisign and other ICANN stakeholders in the coming year on trusted notifier programs to provide transparency and accountability in the .com top level domain.
The amendment repeals Obama-era price controls and provides Verisign the pricing flexibility to change its .com Registry Agreement with ICANN to increase wholesale .com prices. Specifically, the flexibility permits Verisign to pursue with ICANN an up to 7 percent increase in the prices for .com domain names, in each of the last four years of the six-year term of the .com Registry Agreement. The changes also affirm that Verisign may not vertically integrate or operate as a registrar in the .com top level domain.
This story has been updated with additional details.
Small print in the deal requires Verisign to watermark all dotcom websites with an image of Trump™ and the captioned affirmation, “OBEY”.
Incredible, really nice to help small and medium companies like a certain someone likes to say.
Competitive bidding? No, let’s make a monopoly even worse. Disgusting.
What small and medium companies are going to struggle because of this price hike?
So an SMB has to spend $11/year versus $10/year for their domain name ? Please
If you want to be honest and say this is taking money from domain investors pocket into Verisign , that is honest , but this hurting small and medium business line of protest is BS
@Dr Kane – In the aggregate you’re pulling hundreds of millions of dollars over time from small businesses who are the engine of the economy, and enriching the shareholders and senior executives of Verisign, for no increase in product quality or features for your customers.
This is fundamentally at cross purposes with how a market economy is supposed to work. You have applied a tax on growth and are delivering nothing in return.
You can do this because you have monopoly power, but don’t for a second propose that this is remotely fair or good for anyone other than Verisign.
I think it benefits me and I am not Verisign,
I am a shareholder of Verisign as are many Retirement Funds , Pension Funds and Charitable Endowments, whose beneficiaries will all reap the benefits of the price increase.
I’m a shareholder too. But consider that innovation has been one of the main drivers of growth and the improvement in the standard of living for the industrialized world. DoC is rewarding Verisign for doing exactly the opposite. This should be deeply disturbing for anyone who cares about the long-term future of our economy.
Since I can’t reply to your response directly, I am replying to your comment here.
You are playing coy here. An individual or a business with a 7000 domain portfolio is as risk averse as an individual or business with a 40,000 domain portfolio in relative terms. Hence, it is immaterial whether the portfolio is 40,000; 60,000; 80,000; 7,000; or even 1000 for that matter. These individuals and businesses maintain these level of portfolio because that is what they can afford to risk or afford to keep. Adding extra cost to that portfolio means that someone may need to decide to cut down on that portfolio as a result of that added cost of doing business. After all you don’t turn over your entire portfolio every year. So that additional carrying cost may be a drag on profitability.
I know I did. I cut my portfolio less than half as the cost inched up years back. I will probably cut it again if such increases as being reported comes to be in effect.
Of course, some will eat the cost and some will adjust their prices. The net effect is that there will be adjustments made because at the end of the day, people hold these portfolios to make money. The resulting effect of the carrying cost will influence what will be done with that portfolio or about that portfolio going forward.
@Dr Kane, I have a small company, not even medium, and I have THOUSANDS of domains.
With all due respect, you are way off here.
What are the businesses who control domain portfolios with majority being “.com” in that portfolio? Do you think that the thousands of domain portfolio holders are immune to cost shock?
If a portfolio holder on the aggregate incurs a 7% price hike, how do you think that will affect his cost of doing business? On that premise, let’s assume that the said portfolio holder has 40,000 domain names in .com. At your price of $11.00, you are looking at a $28,800.00 additional cost per year.
I will take it that you don’t think $28,800.00 additional cost overlay for an SMB is a big deal? Perhaps, do you believe these portfolio holders are not part of SMBs?
How many people have 40,000 domain name portfolios ?
Stop pretending that it affects SMB’s everywhere and really just affects a super tiny subset of people who invest in domain names
@Dr. kane – Do those people not matter even if they are the minority? Small,medium and large businesses buy domains from large portfolio holders and will now have to pay more for domains so that the large holders can cover these increases. So yes, it will effect more than just the “tiny subset”. if prices are 7% times four years, that is nearly 100k in additional costs for me which will either have to be passed on to end users buying domains from me or cut from inventory.
Dr. Kane you’re either trolling or you’re clueless, or perhaps you just can’t stop looking at your retirement account long enough to think before you type. Either way you clearly lack even a minimal understanding of economics. So let me enlighten you. This isn’t really about domain investors. If every small business in the world using a .com domain get’s nearly a 7% price increase every year for 4 years, that’s hundreds of millions of dollars IN THE AGGREGATE that they will not be able to spend on other goods and services that really drive the economy. If there were any improvement in the product, then the price increase would be justified by increase in productivity by .com customers. Instead that money will shift to a few execs at Verisign and their shareholders where it will have far less of an impact on the economy.
Love to see domain investors upset that Verisign is given price flexibility to raise prices (although they are still limited to a small percentage) , yet are fully behind the idea that they can charge as much as they want in the secondary market for a domain they exclusively own
Wonder why the US Government and others laugh away their concerns about controlling prices on an exclusive asset
True.
@Domain Princess
That’s because domain investors and large companies with large domain portfolios operate in a free market and can charge whatever they like for a domain they exclusively own when buyers come knocking on their door. It’s basic economics — highly limited supply and, for at least the top 2% of .com domain names, extremely high demand.
It’s different for Versign, which controls a licensed monopoly and holds monopoly power by government fiat. Verisign adds little value to the domain name manufacturing process beyond what any other registry operator company could also do, if Verisign operated in a free market in the face of real competition from other registry operators competing on price. It does not. The government is right to heavily regulate Verisign’s monopoly. Crony capitalism inside the Trump Administration — there are surely bribes going on behind the scenes up and down the East Coast here — is what has created an abominable agreement like this one.
@Steve B.
Not true.
I wish someone would reduce the regulatory burden on me.
This brings .COM inline with other TLDs who have been able to do the same thing for a long time now. So it is difficult to argue against.
But it is also a step in the direction of eventually removing pricing controls entirely by adjusting the rate upwards with each contract.
Nice to now know what we face for the next 6 years.
This is disgusting at best, and extremely predatory. Verisign has no reason to need more money, it rakes it in hand-over-fist with its monopoly. There is no reason for it to be able to charge more money. This takes money away from the world and is a tax-hike. This needs to lead to a competitive bid of the .com contract. It shows how Verisign is only working in the efforts of its pocketbook.
Absolutely Unbelievable!!!
David Redl just made a grave mistake by allowing VeriSign to increase prices of .COM domain names.
The amount of money VeriSign generates is absolutely insane (before this announced price hike.)
Now, the economics of this no-bid contract will be amplified even further. David Redl just created one of the most lucrative monopolies in the modern world. This will go down as one of David Redl’s biggest mistakes. No matter how you look at it, this was a horrible mistake by the NTIA. The NTIA and David Redl did not act in the best interest of the DNS Industry and US Internet users.
David Redl acted in the best interest of only one entity: VeriSign. There is absolutely no justification why VeriSign should be allowed to increase prices any further. Was David Redl swayed by the millions in lobbying fees paid by VeriSign?
David: Did your friends at Arnold and Porter have your ear?
Here are my questions for David Redl:
* Did you take the time to do basic research to determine how unbelievably lucrative this contact is for VeriSign?
* Did you conduct an economic study of VeriSign’s operating margins?
* Did you analyze the amount of free cash flow generated from this no-bid contract?
* Do you realize the massive market power .COM domains have? According to VeriSign’s own industry brief, there are currently 135.6 million .com domains names registered. The second largest extension only has 22.7 million registrations. More than 480 of the Fortune 500 companies use a .com for their company URL. Simply put, .com domains continue to have overall market power and has significant global demand in the marketplace.
* Did you open up a public comment period on .com pricing and did you solicit or listen to any feedback from any of the stakeholders from within the industry (not just VeriSign?)
* Did you consider this contract has never been sent out for competitive bid and that everyone knows that .com domains should only cost $1.75 – $3.00 each at most.
If the .com contract were to be sent out for competitive bid, several large US-based technology organizations would be able to administer it with the same level of security, stability, and technical excellence as VeriSign—for less than $3.00 per domain. This is less than half the cost of what VeriSign charges today. Such an outcome would be fair and it would bring prices to reasonable market levels. Potential suitors to manage the extension include Google, IBM, Microsoft, Amazon, Sun Microsystems, AT&T, CloudFlare and already established registries such as Neustar and Afilias.
* Did you know that over the past 6 years (2012 through 2017) VeriSign has only put $275 million into Capital Expenses to invest in additional networking, bandwidth and server upgrades. At the same time, it spent $4.17 billion dollars to repurchase its own stock. From 2009 through 2017, VeriSign repurchased $5.4 billion of common stock at an average amount of $603 million per year. Instead of investing cash into its business and upgrading its infrastructure, VeriSign is investing purely in its own stock.
* Did you know VeriSign’s Cost to Operate the Registry has remained flat since 2009? Even though VeriSign added 54 million new domains to its base since 2009, the cost to operate the entire business have have not changed at all. It cost $455 million to run VeriSign in 2009, and it cost $455 million to run VeriSign in 2017. The base of domains has grown 55.0% from 2009 to 2018, yet the cost to operate the business has remained flat. This level of earnings-to-operational expenses is unheard of in the tech industry.
* Did you know that VeriSign currently employees fewer employees than ever before – Even though the number of domains has increased by more than 50% since 2009, VeriSign continues to reduce staffing. In 2009, VeriSign had 1,100 full-time employees. At the end of 2017, VeriSign ended the year with only 952 full-time employees. On the Q2 2018 Earnings Conference Call, VeriSign reported only 941 employees. While Revenues have grown 89.2% since 2009, the number of full time employee has decreased by 13.5%.
* Did you know according to a 2017 Washington Post report analyzing the pay ratios between a company’s CEO and its workers, VeriSign was listed as the second-highest-paying technology company, with median employee compensation of $171,615. Only Facebook, with a $240,430 median, was higher in the tech sector. Meanwhile, VeriSign’s CEO, D. James Bidzo, compensation amounted to $46.0 million over the past 5 years alone, an average of $9.2 million per year.
* Did you know VeriSign’s operating margins have climbed from 26.0% in 2009 to 60.7% for the full year end 2017. In the most recent Q3 2018 quarterly earnings call, VeriSign announced its margins reached the highest levels yet of 63.8%.
* Did you consult with the Antitrust division of the DOJ and Makam Delrahim regarding this monopoly?
* Why justification do you have to hand VeriSign a BILLION dollar gift on a no-bid contact?
David Redl – as Acting Assistant Secretary for the NTIA, why should we pump so much money into a company operating a no-bid contract? A pure monopoly! What benefit does this give the DNS sector and Internet users throughout the world?
Don
Don’t be surprised if Mr. Redl’s next gig is in Reston….
Yeah, ironically after he rails against ICANN for its revolving door…
VRSN shares up about nearly 6% in after hours trading
Yup, time to buy Verisign stock instead of domain names. 🙂
I find this line from the NTIA intriguing:
“The amendment repeals Obama-era price controls”
Sure, but there are still price controls. Just a higher price. Whomever negotiated the initial 7% hikes on behalf of Verisign is patting themselves on the back. The number doesn’t really have any justification and seems random.
7’s the key number here. Think about it. 7-Elevens. 7 dwarves. 7, man, that’s the number. 7 chipmunks twirlin’ on a branch, eatin’ lots of sunflowers on my uncle’s ranch. You know that old children’s tale from the sea.
It’s like you’re dreamin’ about Gorgonzola cheese when it’s clearly Brie time, baby. Step into my office.
https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/info-agmt-pdf-22aug13-en.pdf
“may not exceed the Maximum Service Fee during the preceding calendar year multiplied by 1.10”
In other words .INFO can increase 10% per year.
Last price increase was to .INFO $10.84 on Sept 1, 2018 of this year from $9.86 effective on July 1, 2017 or 9.9% increase.
So dunno where 7% came from, but its less that Afilias 10% which they have been taking advantage of.
Right, but 7% is the same amount Verisign has had under previous contracts.
That’s what happens when you create monopolies, oligopolies and you have widespread corruption at political level …
Corporate lobbies can’t care less about other people …
You got what you sow …
Assistant Attorney General Deborah Garza for the Antitrust Division of the DOJ explained in a 2008 letter to the NTIA:
“First, we found that VeriSign possesses significant market power as the operator of the .com registry because many registrants do not perceive .com and other gTLDs (such as .biz and .info) and country code TLD’s (“ccTLDs,” such as .uk and .de) to be substitutes. Instead, registrants frequently purchase domains in TLD’s other than .com as complements to .com domains, not as substitutes for them. In other words, registrants of a particular .com domain (e.g., google.com) will frequently also perceive a need to register the same domain in all or most available TLD’s (e.g., google.info and google.biz) because of a desire to expand their presence on the Internet and to protect their brands from being exploited by others.
We also concluded that existing gTLDs likely would not become a competitive threat to .com registrations because of the networks effects that make .com registrations so valuable to consumers will be difficult for other TLDs to overcome. Due to a first-mover advantage and high brand awareness, .com registrants account for the overwhelming majority of gTLD registrations. As a result, when users do not know the TLD in which a domain name is registered, they most often simply append “.com” to product or company name when attempting to find the desired website. This phenomenon creates a strong preference for .com. Accordingly there will continue to be a need for Section 7.3 of the .com registry agreement [which sets price conditions for domain name registrations and registry services] to replace the discipline that market competition does not provide in this setting, as well as continuing DOC oversight of the .com registry under the Cooperative Agreement [between VeriSign and the United States Government], which precludes VeriSign from amending or renewing the .com agreement without DOC approval.”
There are several reasons why 7% & why VeriSign … but it may get worse if any other registry get their hands on .com – “introducing premium model” – and Verisign don’t play dusty games and they know who you are and they don’t care if you ask $1m for something you pay today $x per year.
VeriCrime
Congrats to Phil Corwin!
7% is no big deal but the problem as I see it is registrars use it as an excuse to increase prices on their side too.
Oops I missed that 7% during 4 of the six years..if they raise the max all 4 years there are going to be a lot of people unhappy with them. I hope they are reasonable and don’t take the max.
Anybody that has an interest in what just happened, go back and read the following:
Article by Nat on ICANN’s failure:
https://www.domainarts.com/2011/11/22/upcoming-verisign-price-increase-reminder-of-icanns-failure/
Letter to David Redl from the ICA:
https://www.ntia.doc.gov/files/ntia/publications/ica_comment_-_july_17_2018.pdf
Letter to David Redl from Donald Smith:
https://www.ntia.doc.gov/files/ntia/publications/smith-letter-to-david-redl-ntia-comment-feedback.pdf
Letter to ICANN from George Kirikos:
https://forum.icann.org/lists/comments-com-amendment-30jun16/msg00000.html
Letter to the US Department of Commerce from Phil Corwin:
https://www.internetcommerce.org/slashdotcompricing/
Letter from Senator Ted Cruz, Michael Lee, and Sean Duffy on .com:
https://www.cruz.senate.gov/files/documents/Letters/20160812_DOJ-ICANNLetter.pdf
VeriSign is the toll road of the Internet:
http://sabercapitalmgt.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Verisign-2016-09-02.pdf
GoDaddy VP of Public Policy testifies to Congress and urged the government to maintain price caps:
https://domainnamewire.com/2018/07/31/mr-bladel-goes-to-washington/
Andrew Allemann:
https://domainnamewire.com/2016/08/17/hey-analysts-think-verisigns-com-pricing-going-forward/
by ANDREW ALLEMANN:
https://domainnamewire.com/2010/07/09/verisign-loses-big-in-court-on-com-domains/
Keven Dabney:
https://www.ntia.doc.gov/files/ntia/publications/keven_dabney_comments-v12-final.pdf
Phillip Corwin (now employed by VeriSign):
https://www.internetcommerce.org/the_internet_commerce_association_ica_calls_upon_congress_to_react_to_verisign_price_hikes/
David Goldstein:
http://www.domainpulse.com/2018/10/03/ica-ntia-end-verisigns-reign/
Timothy B Lee:
http://timothyblee.com/2010/01/22/verisign-angling-for-no-bid-contract-renewal/
http://www.abcbrand.com/2017/05/verisign-billion-dollar-no-bid-contract.html
http://www.seedoftomorrow.com/investment-idea-verisign/
February 15, 2018:
https://www.thenation.com/article/special-investigation-the-dirty-secret-behind-warren-buffetts-billions/
The dominant narrative around Buffett is that he invests in big, blue-chip companies whose products he enjoys, like Coca-Cola or Heinz ketchup. But Buffett’s taste for junk food cannot match his hunger for monopoly, and he scours the investment landscape to satisfy it. For example, he’s a major investor in the most profitable company you’ve never heard of—one used by hundreds of millions of people worldwide, mostly without their knowledge.
The company is called Verisign, and it operates an essential backbone of the Internet: registries for the domain names .com and .net, among others. If you want to create, for example, MyWebsite.com, you buy the name from a retailer like GoDaddy. But Verisign controls the global registry for .com, so GoDaddy relies on Verisign to connect users to MyWebsite.com. Verisign collects a small fee for this service, usually less than $10 a year. But drawing that fee from an enormous pool of websites results in a massive revenue stream.
As of September 2017, two of Verisign’s domain-name registries, the aforementioned .com and .net, accounted for 145.8 million of the 330.7 million websites in existence, or nearly one in two. Take away the 144.7 million sites tied to a specific country (like .us, or .cn for China), and it’s more like four out of five. Any company controlling 80 percent of a given market can safely be termed a monopoly, though a spokesperson for Verisign said in a statement that “we believe competition is thriving in the market.”
The nonprofit Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the registry industry’s main regulator, granted Verisign exclusive contracts to operate .com and .net. Verisign can automatically renew the contracts as long as it meets certain performance metrics. The company was also initially permitted to raise prices gradually, despite the fact that the costs of managing a registry decline over time because the necessary infrastructure is already established.
“If you’re giving a near monopoly in an industry where prices are falling, you would think that you would have terms in the contract to lower the price,” said economist Dean Baker, a critic of government-granted monopolies. Instead, prices for .net domain names can rise 10 percent per year; they’ve more than doubled since 2005, from $3.50 to $9.02 (Verisign’s statement called this price “lower than most competing legacy [top-level domains]”). Prices for .com domain names have also risen, though they are now frozen at $7.85 per year, due to an amended contract executed in 2012. Competitors have offered to run registries at significantly cheaper rates, yet ICANN hasn’t altered Verisign’s contract terms.
Normally, companies with regulated prices aren’t profit-making juggernauts. But in the third quarter of 2017, Verisign’s operating income as a percentage of revenue hit 61.9 percent, putting it near the top of all companies in the S&P 500. This number has climbed steadily since 2006. If the trend continues, sometime in the next decade Verisign will post the highest rate of profitability of any public company on earth.
That may explain why Buffett owns nearly 13 million shares of Verisign stock, worth $1.47 billion as of mid-January 2018. Buffett is famously averse to Internet stocks, but he does like a sure thing. So does the rest of the market: Verisign stock jumped nearly 44 percent in 2017. Buffett’s seal of approval tends to boost fortunes on Wall Street, so more money flows into monopolies.
By ANDREW ALLEMANN:
https://domainnamewire.com/2014/08/10/a-good-snyopsis-of-verisigns-monopoly-contract/
https://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/09/business/technology-rivals-say-verisign-still-has-advantage.html
to follow up on why John Berryhill congratulated Phil Corwin above:
Phil Corwin now works for VeriSign. Phil was offered a “sweetheart” deal in his own words, he received an offer he “could not refuse”
Phil Corwin was one of VeriSign’s core critics. Phil was counsel for the ICA and focused on .com pricing and the VeriSign monopoly.
Phil Corwin did an great job in his analysis on the VeriSign monopoly back in 2012:
https://www.internetcommerce.org/slashdotcompricing/
However, at the end of 2017 – VeriSign decided that it was best to silence Phil Corwin and hire him on as a full-time employee.
So VeriSign was able to silence one of is core critics in a quick $725,000 yearly hire.
Not a bad strategy when you can afford to pay off all of your core critics…….
This is another ball like that of the bubble from 1998 to 1999 and 2000.
Who is the winning participant of this 7% increase?
Stock market Verising & Nasdaq?
The one that has more than 5000 domains (.com) and its value is $ 500 Millions. I do not think that this increase will affect it since it increases its value today is $ 650 Million.
In any price increase in a domain market (.com) there is a past and a present, now you have to see who is the winner and your reasons will be to participate in a four-year-old ball….. very difficult to understand in your information. today.
This decision makes no sense at all.
PROBE.
There needs to be a probe on this agreement.
A PROBE and a CLASS ACTION.
It now cost $7 to buy .BEST domain names at DomainCostClub.com. Multi-year registrations available, up to 10 years. I leave that here.
Well I think it is far better to control or limit your investment portfolio to top quality business or keyword .com domains only for which I am now aiming rather than having too many crappy domains which do cost a fortune to run especially with these yearly increases!
Really is amazing to me. With all the things that domainers could and should be outraged about, this is about 25th on the list! Things that have actually mattered go ignored but silly stuff like this gets everyones panties in a knot!
The fight was MANY years ago and domainers never showed up or supported the fight when it actually counted! Now they are outraged???
GIVE ME A BREAK!
That was when domainers were bragging about their 250,000 domain portfolios in lieu of quality.
The fight is over. The battle and the war was 14 years ago!!
A Happy meal costs more than a domain with a worldwide presence and a chance to find fame and fortune. Your collective outrage is foolish, laughable and misguided!!
It’s not about the price, it’s about the monopoly/mafia.
I noticed another poster with the name Don, I am not that guy. I only posted this “It’s not about the price, it’s about the monopoly/mafia.”
David Redl said he believes in the ICANN multi stakeholder model.
Yet, what Mr. Redl just did with this closed door / backdoor negotiation with VeriSign is simply wrong. There should be an ethics investigation.
There is no transparency and David Redl did not even open a public comment period on .com pricing. David just caved to the demands of VeriSign and did not even bother to pull back the curtains.
There is absolutely no reason or justification for allowing VeriSign to increase prices any further. None whatsoever.
VeriSign has been printing money from the no-bid contract for many years and the numbers have reached astronomical levels at the existing $7.85 price point. In the most recent quarter, VeriSign reported Net Income of $138M on $306M in Revenue and operating margin reached 63.8% (non-GAAP operating margin hit 68.75%.) These are crazy high margins – and the only reason why is because the .com contract has never been sent out for competitive bid. Most companies can only dream of these types of operating margins.
But now, with this Amendment to the Cooperative Agreement, David Redl granted the monopoly the ability to increase .com prices 7% in years 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024. when you compound 7% over 4 years, the financials become insane.
This will result in VeriSign generating more than $1 Billion in Net Income per year (up from the expected $541 Million in Net Income for fiscal year 2018.)
What about accountability?
What about acting in the best interest of American Business and Internet users?
Why did Mr. Redl go out of his way to allow VeriSign to increase prices by 7.0% each year?
David could have just kept the price freeze in place, but no——-he went out of his way to pour significantly more cash into this monopoly!
Reminder: When Larry Strickling froze .com prices at $7.85 back in 2012, VeriSign ended 2011 and 2012 with $141.1 Million and $322.7 Million in Net Income respectively. Larry said that “Consumers will benefit” from lower prices. But this fiscal year (2018) VeriSign will generate $541 Million in Net Income.
Makan Delrahim – are you aware of what David Redl just did? The Antitrust division of the DOJ has an obligation to step in and fix this remarkable mistake.
There is absolutely no justification for increasing prices any further on a no-bid contract. Competitive bids promotes reasonable prices & prevents monopolistic profiteering.
#DavidRedl_Incompetent_for_NTIA
Only governments can print money, not private companies !
THIS IS PURE NON SENSE
98 percent of domains are worthless. Out of 150 million coms, imagine verisign profit dropping 99 percent to maintain that 480 fortune 500 names or 2 percent club. Why , they could raise the price to one million or more and earn double what they earn today .Domains are overrated. And many are using umbrella of other sites since google indexes everything.
anyone find it suspicious raise was 7% 3 years ago and today inflation is exactly 7% when the price hikes kick in? This was all pre foreshadowed, pre orchestrated. This is now a command and control managed economy. free market is dead.
Um, no, I don’t find that suspicious. And if inflation stays at 7%, I bet Verisign is going to ask for more money.