Alternative Investments - Domain Names

VeriSign reports that there has been 25% increase in domain name registrations, proving that even in these economically difficult times demand domain names remains strong. A domain name registration costs around $10 but domain name aftermarket sales are a whole different story. Good names can costs millions ! The highest domain sales so far this year have been Fund.com sold for $9.9 million - DataRecovery.com for $1.65M and Cruises.co.uk for $1.1M

In its latest report, VeriSign says that in Q1 2008 there were 14 million new domain names registered, increasing the overall total to 162 million, which represents a 6% rise over the previous quarter and a 26% annual rise.

It is the .com extension that has by far the most registrations, followed by .de (Germany), .cn (China), .net, .uk and .org.

The strong growth in domain name registrations is the result of rising numbers of Internet users in countries such as China and India, there has also been evidence of Chinese companies registering Indian names in an attempt to gain market share or sell the names back to the Indian companies at inflated prices.

Raynor Dahlquist, Senior VP of Verisign said : "Rapidly emerging regions like India underscore the importance of ensuring that the Internet infrastructure is able to serve every corner of the world.”

Domain name investments are one area where investors can make a lot of money, either by registering a name for $10 and waiting for someone to ask you to sell it to them, or by buying a name that has already been registered, for a few hundred dollars in the expectation that in a couple of years time it will be worth even more.

While waiting for the sale to come along you can park your domain name free of charge with a company such as NameDrive and earn revenue from the ads. placed on your domain.

For further information about domain name investing see Domain Names

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