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Dynadot jumps into top 10

by — Domain Registrars 2 Comments

Dynadot jumps into the top ten registrars for new .com registrations.

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 April 2019.

An anomaly this month is Dynadot, which jumped into the top ten for monthly .com registrations. This pushed NameSilo out of the top ten. I think this has to do with pricing; while NameSilo’s .com sale ended at the end of Q1, Dynadot has continued with discounted pricing. It’s charging $6.99 right now for new .com registrations.

While this means NameSilo is absent from the monthly board this month, it should soon appear on the top ten overall. It has crossed two million .com domains under management but this isn’t reflected in the ICANN numbers, which only go through April.

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

1. GoDaddy.com* 970,751 (NYSE: GDDY) (1,045,199 in March)
2. Xin Net Technology Corporation 324,617 (294,415)
3. Tucows** (NASDAQ:TCX) 191,620 (206,170)
4. NameCheap Inc. 152,606 (160,737)
5. Alibaba (HiChina) 130,946 (126,659)
6. Endurance+ (NASDAQ: EIGI) 125,059 (138,627)
7. Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) 119,976 (135,927)
8. Dynadot 104,837
9. Web.com++  88,873 (83,600)
10. Chengdu West 82,351

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

1. GoDaddy* 50,940,640 (50,831,723 in March)
2. Tucows**  12,484,323 (12,552,098)
3. Endurance+ 7,026,808 (7,065,847)
4. Web.com++ 6,713,881 (6,717,360)
5. Alibaba 6,288,135 (6,226,249)
6. United Internet^ 5,609,664 (5,630,889)
7. Namecheap 4,745,085 (4,694,598)
8. Xin Net Technology Corporation 3,814,331 (3,500,398)
9. Google 2,434,742 (2,361,414)
10. GMO 2,026,751 (2,007,437)

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 and Enom
+ 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

A strong month for .Com

by — Domain Registrars 0 Comments

A strong month for .com

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 March 2019.

March was a strong month for many registrars. GoDaddy topped 1 million new registrations and others had lots of new registrations, too. United-Domains fell off the monthly performance chart as GMO jumped on.

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

1. GoDaddy.com* (NYSE: GDDY) 1,045,199 (884,685 in February)
2. Xin Net Technology Corporation 294,415 (123,707)
3. Tucows** (NASDAQ:TCX) 206,170 (193,620)
4. NameCheap Inc. 160,737 (146,380)
5. Endurance+ (NASDAQ: EIGI) 138,627 (126,422)
6. Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) 135,927 (112,636)
7. Alibaba (HiChina) 126,659 (76,420)
8. NameSilo (CSE:URL) 95,985 (69,317)
9. GMO 89,155
10. Web.com++ 83,600 (83,164)

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

1. GoDaddy* 50,831,723 (50,529,991 in February)
2. Tucows** 12,552,098  (12,554,559)
3. Endurance+ 7,065,847 (7,076,003)
4. Web.com++ 6,717,360
5. Alibaba 6,226,249 (6,193,225)
6. United Internet^ 5,630,889 (5,629,371)
7. Namecheap 4,694,598 (4,627,488)
8. Xin Net Technology Corporation 3,500,398 (3,272,339)
9. Google 2,361,414 (2,266,405)
10. GMO 2,007,437 (1,965,061)

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 and Enom
+ 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

.Com Winners & Losers

by — Domain Registrars 0 Comments

The latest data about domain name registrars and .com domain names.

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 February 2019.

Starting this month, I’m including 123 Reg in GoDaddy’s numbers. This pushes its .com total to over 50 million.

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

1. GoDaddy.com* 884,685 (NYSE: GDDY)
2. Tucows** (NASDAQ:TCX) 193,620  (214,018 in January)
3. NameCheap Inc. 146380 (160,061)
4. Endurance+ (NASDAQ: EIGI) 126422  (139,405)
5. Xin Net Technology Corporation 123,707 (217,462)
6. Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) 112,636 (116,104)
7. Web.com++ 83,164 (108,996)
8. Alibaba (HiChina) 76,420 (97,945)
9. United Internet^ (FRA: UTDI) 70,794 (77,587 )
10. NameSilo (CSE:URL) 69,317 (72,182)

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

1. GoDaddy* 50,529,991
2. Tucows** 12,554,559 (12,564,886 in January)
3. Endurance+ 7,076,003 (7,091,446)
4. Web.com++  (6,727,908)
5. Alibaba 6,193,225 (6,208,947)
6. United Internet^ 5,629,371 (5,631,764 )
7. Namecheap 4,627,488 (4,592,302)
8. Xin Net Technology Corporation 3,272,339 (3,181,547 )
9. Google 2,266,405 (2,187,443)
10. GMO 1,965,061 (1,959,506 )

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 and Enom
+ 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

.Com slips at GoDaddy

by — Domain Registrars 8 Comments

Expirations outpaced new registrations at GoDaddy in December.

ICANN has published the latest official data from Verisign (NASDAQ: VRSN) about the .com namespace. This registrar-by-registrar report covers December 2018.

Something interesting happened in December: GoDaddy’s .com domains under management (DUMs) dropped. I’ve tracked monthly numbers for a long time and don’t recall this happening in recent history.

The drop isn’t due to a large outbound transfer. In fact, GoDaddy’s net transfer loss was less than 10,000. It’s just that more .com names expired at GoDaddy than it got in new registrations.

Note that this only includes GoDaddy and Wild West Domains. It doesn’t include GoDaddy’s smaller registrars and the ones it picked up in the Host Europe Group acquisition.

Now, to the numbers. Here’s how registrars did in terms of new .com registrations.

1. GoDaddy.com* (NYSE: GDDY) 824,821 (865,438 in November)
2. Xin Net Technology Corporation 207,506 (152,143)
3. Alibaba (HiChina) 169,910 (312,227)
4. Tucows** (NASDAQ:TCX) 155,809 (175,148)
5. NameCheap Inc. 129,114 (157,607)
6. Web.com++ 101,629 (97,702)
7. NameSilo (CSE:URL) 94,849 (130,713)
8. Endurance+ (NASDAQ: EIGI) 91,577 (123,087)
9. Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) 85,799 (88,236)
10. United Internet^ (FRA: UTDI) 60,004 (66,501)

Here’s the leaderboard of the top registrars in terms of total .com registrations as of the end of December 2018.

1. GoDaddy* 49,354,689 (49,370,531 in November)
2. Tucows** 12,583,119 (12,659,835)
3. Endurance+ 7,124,825 (7,179,580)
4. Web.com++ 6,726,237 (6,732,478)
5. Alibaba 6,248,273 (6,192,801)
6. United Internet^ 5,640,149 (5,666,856)
7. Namecheap 4,535,855 (4,515,221)
8. Xin Net Technology Corporation 2,987,431 (2,792,514)
9. Google 2,106,955 (2,057,844)
10. GMO 1,953,479 (1,964,580)

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

* Includes GoDaddy and Wild West Domains
** Includes Tucows and Enom
+ 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

Tucows sold $3.2 million of domains to GoDaddy (and more from earnings call)

by — Domain Registrars 4 Comments

Tucows reveals portfolio sale price and data center plans.

Tucows logoDomain name, mobile and internet services company Tucows (NASDAQ: TCX) released earnings for Q4 and full-year 2018 yesterday.

In its pre-recorded commentary about the earnings, the company disclosed that it generated about $3.2 million from a bulk sale of domains from its portfolio in Q4. Elliot Silver reported on this transaction with GoDaddy in December. The two companies completed a similar transaction in Q4 2017 but for only $2 million. The 2017 transaction was for approximately 10% of Tucows’ domain portfolio excluding surname domain names.

It will be interesting to see if Tucows does another Q4 transaction this year.

Tucows CEO Elliot Noss made a couple of other interesting comments during the call.

First, the company bought land in Centennial, Colorado to build a data center.

Second, Noss said he’s more concerned about a recession in 2019 than in over a decade. He made the comment in relation to how the company handles share buybacks:

Today, we again announced an open market buyback program that will commence immediately. The program will allow us to repurchase up to $40 million worth of our shares over the course of the next 12 months. This year, more than any year since 2007, I find myself concerned about a possible recession. That potential will inform our thinking in terms of the program.

The earnings release is here.