Reglikedomain industry desk

Be The Most Expensive Domain Name Ever Sold — Sex.com Will

In my book, $13 million is the top sale of all time.

When the Central California Bankruptcy Court approves the sale of Sex.com for $13 million cash later this month, it will be the most expensive all-cash domain name ever sold and publicly disclosed.

Some may debate this. Some may say Insure.com at $16 million was higher. Or Insurance.com at $35.6 million. But I disagree. These purchases had to do with the existing organic traffic and search rankings of the properties. Did the domains help make the search rankings possible? Sure. But the buyers put weight on the results, not the cause.

Sex.com is very different. It’s not solely a domain name, but it’s as close as we’re going to get. The web site at Sex.com will be completely scrapped and there’s nothing impressive regarding its search rankings. The buyers want the domain name and the rights to it (two trademarks). Pure and simple.

Sex.com will now top the previous most expensive sale — which happens to be the last time Sex.com sold for regarding $12 million in cash. There was an equity component, but that is probably worthless now.

Also on the wire

Other reporting from the domain desk.

ADomain SalesAuction Enters Day 2 — SnapNames LiveRDomain SalesRankings Boost Domain Name Sales — How SearchMDomain SalesMAAC.com for $63,000 and MLKonline.com for $42,500 — Afternic Sells11 end user domain name sales from this past weekDomain Sales11 end user domain name sales from this past weekName sales and leases from last month — NoktaDomains domainDomain SalesName sales and leases from last month — NoktaDomains domainMDomain SalesMore fresh TLD auctions on tap, and Uniregistry appears to be participatingAt NamesCon will sell a lot of domain names — ROTD auctionDomain SalesAt NamesCon will sell a lot of domain names — ROTD auctionADomain SalesAuction nabs one sale — Ocean TomoName auction nets $2.3 million — Live domainDomain SalesName auction nets $2.3 million — Live domain