I recently learned about an excellent domain name sale that I am permitted to share publicly. Last week, Koko.com was sold privately for a little over $100,000. The deal did not include a non disclosure agreement, so the seller was willing to share news of the sale as well as the sale price. I understand that the buyer contacted the seller via the Whois email, and the negotiation took place over the course of a few weeks, all in Chinese. The sale price was 620k RMB, which is just over $100k USD.
The seller of the domain name is iGenesis Limited, a domain investment company based in Hong Kong. A historical Whois search shows that iGenesis appears to have acquired the domain name in late 2005. I was told the domain name was acquired for $12k via GreatDomains.
The transaction was done using the Chinese registrar and marketplace ename.com. Their system allows a push of the domain name and the transfer of funds in opposite directions simultaneously. A seller needs to have a bank account in China in order to retrieve the funds out of the registrar account.
Now that the Whois record has updated, the buyer appears to be an entity based in China. At the present time, the Koko.com domain name does not resolve, so I am unable to see how this domain name will be used at the time of this post.
When people reference the large number of private sales that go unreported, this likely would have been one of them. Had I not asked (very nicely) if I could share news of this sale, it’s likely that this sale would not have been revealed. Now that it has been made public, my guess is Ron Jackson will read about it and ask for the escrow verification in order to add it to the weekly sale report on DNJournal, and we will likely see it amongst the largest sales of the week. This just as easily could have gone unreported, and I think it’s important to note because there are a lot of people and companies that don’t report domain name sales for a variety of reasons.
When I learn more about how Koko.com will be used, I will try and provide an update.
Thanks for sharing Elliot and a nice sale by iGenesis. Congrats to both parties. As per WHOIS records, iGenesis Limited owns some really nice domains.
Researching a recent domain in the news, I learned about iGenesis. What was it?
Yes, iGenesis purchased Cellist.com via Sedo for 1050 USD.
That excellent domain name at the cheap buyer’s price stood out to me. Here was my comment:
http://www.thedomains.com/2014/09/11/sedo-weekly-sales-1-4-million-led-by-musik-de/comment-page-1/#comment-153181
Hi Louise,
Yes, we did purchase cellist.com in the last monthly Sedo/GreatDomains auction. It was a public auction and we bought it in the open so there’s no funny business going on there. FYI we actually purchased Cellists.com (the plural) through a private deal not long before that, and that was the main reason we placed the bid on the singular too.
Congrats on the amazing acquisition[s]!!! 🙂
I am interested in buying one of your domain. Please reply. I am in Texas, USA. Thanks!