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NameSilo sold $840k of bitcoin before the crash

by — Domain Registrars 5 Comments

Registrar cashed out before market turmoil hit.

cryptocurrency

NameSilo sold bitcoin before the crash.

Like many assets, the value of bitcoin fell precipitously in recent weeks.  The value of a bitcoin has fallen in about half.

One domain name company had the good fortune of selling a cache of bitcoin before the market tumbled: NameSilo (OTC: URLOF) sold over 84 bitcoin at USD $9,957.15 each on February 19.  That gave it gross proceeds of USD $839,000.

At Friday’s price, it would have only been worth about $440,000.

The company collected the bitcoin as payments from its domain name registrar customers. In the earlier days of cryptocurrencies, I believe most companies that accepted cryptocurrency for payment immediately converted them into cash to offload the risk of price changes. That’s clearly not the case with NameSilo.

How domain name stocks fared in stock market rout

by — Domain Registrars 7 Comments

Not well.

Picture of man in front of computer showing falling stock prices

Stock markets were up nearly 10% on Friday, and it was a sigh of relief in a tumultuous period.

Stocks have been pummelled as the world goes into hiding over fears of the COVID-19 outbreak. The Dow 30 is down 22% since its peak on February 12. The S&P 500 and NASDAQ are both down 20% since their peaks on February 19.

And those numbers looked a lot worse the day before.

Here’s how domain name stocks have fared from their 2020 peak through Friday’s close:

Verisign (NASDAQ: VRSN): Verisign is off 16% from its high on February 6. It makes sense that the stock wouldn’t be as hard hit as the overall market. It delivers consistent, subscription-based revenue that is likely to go up as it’s allowed to raise prices.

Tucows (NASDAQ: TCX): Shares in the company that owns Enom have dropped 29% from their peak on January 16.

GoDaddy (NYSE: GDDY): GoDaddy’s value has fallen 30% between February 14 and now. I’m curious about what impact the economic and social changes of the novel coronavirus will have on domain name registrars and hosting companies.

Endurance (NASDAQ: EIGI): It’s a demoralizing time at Endurance, a rollup of domain name and hosting companies. Shares peaked this year on February 6 and have fallen by 57% since then. Is it overdone? Endurance’s management thinks so; it authorized a $40 million share buyback plan on March 10.

CentralNic (London AIM: CNIC): I hesitated to include CentralNic and the next two companies in this post. They are thinly traded so changes might not reflect the current market. But CentralNic’s shares are down 24% from a peak on January 2.

MMX (London AIM: MMX): New top level domain operator MMX (Minds + Machines) has seen its stock fall 25% from its peak on February 7.

NameSilo (OTC: URLOF): Shares in this registrar are down 50% since January 9. You have to give NameSilo some props for this well-timed sale of bitcoin, though.

This might present a buying opportunity if you think the world and market will rebound soon. I do not own individual shares in publicly-traded domain name companies to avoid a conflict of interest. Mutual funds I own, including index funds, do hold some of these stocks.

.Com Winners & Losers: NameSilo enters top 10 overall

by — Domain Registrars 1 Comment

NameSilo bumps GMO off the list.

Image of man running up column chart with words "Top 10 Registrars"

ICANN has published the latest official data from Verisign (NASDAQ: VRSN) about the .com namespace. This registrar-by-registrar report covers August 2019.

NameSilo has broken into the top 10 for .com domains under management, pushing GMO off the list. On the monthly charts, there was a bit of place-swapping but the same 10 registrars are the list for August that were on it for July.

Here’s how registrars did in terms of new .com registrations:

1. GoDaddy.com* (NYSE: GDDY) 862,732 (854,643 in July)
2. Xin Net Technology Corporation 219,802 (321,742)
3. Tucows** 187,769 (NASDAQ:TCX) (194,581)
4. NameCheap Inc. 161,107 (161,790)
5. Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) 141,014 (134,583)
6. Alibaba (HiChina) 136,895 (126,586)
7. Endurance+ (NASDAQ: EIGI) 126,603 (129,559)
8. Dynadot 87,388 (131,601)
9. NameSilo (CSE:URL) 69,045 (89,027)
10. GMO 66,910 (66,323)

Here’s the leaderboard of the top registrars in terms of total .com registrations as of the end of August 2019.

1. GoDaddy* 51,098,287 (51,022,025 in July)
2. Tucows** 13,123,695 (13,192,663)
3. Endurance+ 6,886,901 (6,896,718)
4. Web.com++ 6,607,353 (6,599,516)
5. Alibaba 6,189,184 (6,232,572)
6. United Internet^ 5,549,520 (5,550,220)
7. Namecheap 4,978,908 (4,915,798)
8. Xin Net Technology Corporation 4,575,392 (4,469,021)
9. Google 2,755,721 (2,662,532)
10. NameSilo 2,127,096 (n/a)

Many domain companies have multiple accreditations and I’ve tried to capture the largest ones. See the notes below.

* Includes GoDaddy, Wild West Domains and 123 Reg
** Includes Tucows, Enom, Ascio and EPAG
+ Includes PDR, Domain.com, FastDomain and Bigrock. There are other Endurance registrars, but these are the biggest.
++ Includes Network Solutions and Register.com
^ Includes 1&1, PSI, Cronon, United-Domains, Arsys and world4you

NameSilo posts $7.85 million revenue, readies domain brokerage system

by — Domain Registrars 2 Comments

Registrar continues to grow, readies domain brokerage platform.

Picture of stock ticker board with words "earnings announcement" below it

Domain name registrar NameSilo (CSE: URL) reported third-quarter earnings last week.

The company posted revenues of $7.85 million, up 58% from $4.97 million in the same quarter of 2018. Total revenues through the first three quarters were $21.29 million, more than double last year’s $10.59 million.

NameSilo currently has 3.37 million domains under management. It added 20,000 new customers and 220,000 net new domains under management last quarter.

While the company reported over $1 million net income before tax for the quarter, that’s for the registrar operating subsidiary. The parent company appears to be holding some of the costs, and reported a loss of $0.75 million for the quarter.

The company is getting ready to launch a website builder and, for domainers, a domain brokerage platform called NameLot.

.Com Winners & Losers: A strong month for NameSilo

by — Domain Registrars 0 Comments

NameSilo has strong month. Here’s how other registrars fared.

Image of man running up column chart with words "Top 10 Registrars"

ICANN has published the latest official data from Verisign (NASDAQ: VRSN) about the .com namespace. This registrar-by-registrar report covers June 2019.

NameSilo surged this month, landing at #5 on the monthly list. It’s also nipping at the heels of GMO for #10 on the total .com DUMs chart.

This month I began including Ascio and EPAG in Tucows’ numbers. Previously, I only included Tucows and Enom.

Here’s how registrars did in terms of new .com registrations:

1. GoDaddy.com* (NYSE: GDDY) 844698 (936,916 in May)
2. Xin Net Technology Corporation 254,177 (244,299)
3. Tucows** (NASDAQ:TCX) 188,913 (see note)
4. Alibaba (HiChina) 158,341 (127,090)
5. NameSilo (CSE:URL) 149,951 (86,680)
6. NameCheap Inc. 148,553 (154,281)
7. Chengdu West 128,004 (157,668)
8. Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) 118,274 (119,903)
9. Endurance+ (NASDAQ: EIGI) 117,245 (127,762)
10. United Internet 61,939 (n/a)

Here’s the leaderboard of the top registrars in terms of total .com registrations as of the end of June 2019.

1. GoDaddy* 51,012,237 (51,026,467 in May)
2. Tucows** 13,265,609  (see note)
3. Endurance+ 6,928,107 (6,981,256)
4. Web.com++ 6,638,229 (6,677,492)
5. Alibaba 6,250,554 (6,308,304)
6. United Internet^ 5,558,557 (5,575,836 )
7. Namecheap 4,855,101 (4,799,244)
8. Xin Net Technology Corporation 4,201,902 (3,982,474)
9. Google 2,580,499 (2,506,924)
10. GMO 2,081,293 (2,062,451)

Many domain companies have multiple accreditations and I’ve tried to capture the largest ones. See the notes below.

* Includes GoDaddy, Wild West Domains and 123 Reg
** Includes Tucows, Enom, Ascio and EPAG
+ Includes PDR, Domain.com, FastDomain and Bigrock. There are other Endurance registrars, but these are the biggest.
++ Includes Network Solutions and Register.com
^ Includes 1&1, PSI, Cronon, United-Domains, Arsys and world4you

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