If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

The geographic domain name America.com, which had been put up for auction at Sedo, has not been sold because the reserve price has not been met. The highest bid placed was a petty $1,710,000, although many expected America.com to fetch mid seven figures (including me). What is even worse is that only three bidders were involved and it was only Bidder 3 who raised the bid little by little from $25,000 to the highest bid, probably because he tried to find out what the reserve price was. The other two bidders were not willing to offer more than a few thousand dollars.

I think this auction, just as the TRAFFIC East 2008 live domain auction, is a crystal-clear sign of a weakening economy causing a slowdown in the domain name market. Therefore, I would consider carefully whether to sell domains at the moment, unless you’re willing to let them go at low prices compared to what you could have gotten just a few months ago.

The dry spell will go over as the economy gets back on track. I would take these slow times as a chance to look over your portfolio, see which domains you want to unload, which ones to hold on for and where you see potential for more (e.g. development or strategic partnerships).