Auction company to sell trademarks and domains related to failed online bank, doctor’s web site.
IP Auctions, Inc., is getting ready to auction off the NetBank.com domain name and associated trademarks. The defunct online bank was one of the more popular online banks in its heyday until the feds had to step in and takeover.
IP Auctions, Inc. had the asset listed on its web site but it is no longer there. A cache of the company’s web site shows the auction was scheduled for the end of this month.
The company is also auctioning off DoctorTalk.com on behalf of the Internal Revenue Service and the U.S. Department of Treasury. The domain name and web site was seized by the government because the owner failed to pay his taxes.
The minimum bid is $280,000 according to the IRS web site. A $10,000 deposit is required for bidding.
A look at IP Auctions, Inc’s appraisal for the web site shows a flawed appraisal of $526,000. The appraisal uses discount rates of no more than 10% to calculate the NPV of future cash flows for the site. Anyone with an early stage web venture knows that a discount rate of 20% to 30% (similar to what venture capitalists use) is more reasonable to take into consideration risk. Furthermore, I can’t find anything in the appraisal that considers the costs of running the web site. Even if the appraisal considers the costs (and just doesn’t say it), it appears that much of the revenue is from personal consultations from the doctor that owned the site. His time surely had value, and paying someone to provide these consultations would cost a lot of money.
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