If you bid on auctions at NameJet, you’re probably familiar with the up and down arrows in the control panel control panel buttons.
These buttons allow you to increase or decrease your bid by the standard bid increments. Bidders can also input their maximum bid amount by hand if they prefer, but sometimes it’s just easier hitting the up arrow to place a bid.
Namecheap was recently named expiry auction partner for .AI domain names. The first batch of expired .AI auctions concluded last week, and hundreds of .AI domain names were sold. Namebio shows 695 .AI sales on Namecheap worth nearly $800,000 in the last month, although I can’t filter down to specifically include the expiry auctions.
One of the things people noticed was the number of seemingly new bidders who participated in the auctions. The Namecheap Market platform has a pop-up indicating the activity level of each bidder. Visitors can hover over the badge next to each bidder nickname, and a popup highlights the bidder’s activity, along with their join date.
A general concern some people may have is that new bidders could be more likely to be non-paying bidders. Obviously, bidders who can’t/won’t pay could unfairly increase the final price for other participants. Whether these bidders would theoretically join to cause problems or simply have payment processing issues on the platform, non-paying bidders can increase the cost of domain names for genuine bidders.
If you pick the right domain names and win the auction for the right amount, there is still plenty of money to be made from expired/deleted domain names. Adam Maysonet illustrated this by sharing the results of a recent sale he made on Afternic:
And the first on-hold on @afternic just went through.
Hold time was 4.5 months. Bought it for just under $1k. pic.twitter.com/9Ku3keUQxL
— Adam Maysonet (@synozeer) February 25, 2025
Adam bought Spend.CO for just shy of $1,000. Using the Whois History tool at DomainTools, it would appear that Adam won the domain name in a Sav.com drop catch auction. He then listed the domain name for sale for $12,995 on Afternic, and someone bought it.
A few days ago, I wrote about how the Backpage.com domain name expired and was in pending delete status. Prior to its expiry, Backpage.com had been seized by the US Department of Justice. Backpage.com wasn’t renewed, it fully deleted, and DropCatch.com caught the domain name and sent it to a three day auction.
The auction concluded this afternoon. After dozens of bids and backorders were placed, the auction closed with a high bid of $259,500. A screenshot of the final sale price was shared by Shane Cultra on X:
Namecheap is now running the .AI expiry auctions following a deal with Identity Digital. It looks like the first swath of expired .AI domain names is hitting the auction block in the next few days.
There are some very good descriptive / generic .AI domain names coming up for auction. Among them are Server.ai, Point.ai, Food.ai, Rock.ai, Drill.ai, Shipping.ai and many more. These are empty vessel domain names, and I think they could each be turned into brands in multiple verticals.
In my opinion, these descriptive domain names are investible assets. In fact, I will probably be bidding on some of the descriptive terms, despite having a higher than usual annual renewal cost.
Backpage.com was once one of the most popular classified advertising websites online. According to Wikipedia, “Backpage let users post ads to categories such as personals, automotive, rentals, jobs and adult services. It soon became the second largest online classified site in the United States.” It was also apparently a hub for illicit activities.
In 2018, the US Department of Justice seized the website and Backpage.com domain name. At that time, the USDOJ issued a press release announcing the domain name seizure with a link to the indictment. A screenshot of the landing page from Screenshots.com can be seen below with law enforcement seals and seizure notification:
