Opinions

And this is why you get an NDA!

While I didn’t really share the industry’s excitement regarding the sale of Voice.com for $30 million. Of course it is a good sale and it is good to know the sale happened but we need many more similar sales to get a significant change in domain values.

But I thought of something that will certainly change in the near future!

What will change are the prices quoted to Block.One, the buyer of Voice.com. They set the bar on which all their future domain name acquisitions are going to be compared with. It is one thing knowing that a big company wants to buy your domain and a different thing knowing that the company with the number one domain sale of all time wants to buy your domain.

Of course they can acquire domains in stealth and/or using a domain name broker. Maybe they can use GoDaddy again.

But they must be really careful now before announcing or discussing any future projects as people are going to have Block.One on their radar. They better get their new domains secretly, fast and early.

So this is why the buyer in this domain transaction (Block.One) should have considered asking for an NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement).

Of course it is because of NDAs that most high domain name sales are never reported. So while it was good that we learned about this sale it might not be that good for the buyer.

So this is why I see this aspect of a domain purchase and future acquisitions as a reason for a buyer to ask for an NDA.

And sure people could have found out that the domain name changed hands but they would never have guessed $30 million as the selling price. That seems to be maybe 10 or 20 times above the current domain market level.

Sold.Domains

About Konstantinos Zournas

I studied Computer Engineering and Computer Science in London, UK and I am now living in Athens, Greece. I went online in 1995, started coding in 1996 and began buying domain names and creating websites in 2000. I started the OnlineDomain.com blog in 2012.

11 comments

  1. Hello, Konstantinos:
    Thank you for the Newsletter that I receive dayly and on time.
    One question. Do you think that this price trend will be valid for foreign domain, like Spanish and German?
    I couldview that F.S is actvely buying one-word domains in these languages.
    Thank you.
    Antonio
    Tucoherb@gmail.com

  2. Your thinking about domain value is completely off and you are stuck inside the box of “wrong think” about it. See what I wrote at Morgan Linton’s Tuesday thread about this sale.

    • Konstantinos Zournas

      Yeah yeah…
      The buyer overpaid in today’s market. When we have a different market we can talk again.
      Especially when voice.com is sold for 2-3 million in 5 years.

      • Something tells me you didn’t read what I wrote over there. If you can keep saying “market, market, market” then you’re way off, and way “inside the box.”

      • Konstantinos Zournas

        What makes you think that???

      • I explained it in my comments at Morgan’s thread, but if I give a link here you will accuse me of being rude like last time.

  3. Makes a big difference when the company who owns the domain is a $500M annual revenue company, that has a long track record, compared to some guy who lives in his moms basement. If this was on sedo we are probably talking $500k.

  4. The seller is a public company, I doubt an NDA would be viable as the sale will have a very material effect on their results.

    • Konstantinos Zournas

      What??? Doing an NDA does not mean you are not properly reporting the sale/purchase on your books. You just omit the domain name and/or mix the sale/purchase with other sales/purchases.

      If what you say is true then we would know all domain sales/purchases by public companies, which we don’t.

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