Domainindex.com Downgrades Internet TLD .co.uk and Warns About co.uk and .uk TLD´s

Domainindex.com, the domainindustry's leading benchmarking, TLD analysis, rating and Domain appraisalservice, has announced today that it has changed its rating for .co.uk from AAto B

Domainindex.com, the domainindustry's leading internet domain name benchmarking, rating and appraisalservice, has announced today that it has changed its rating for .co.uk from AAto B. The step has been taken after the release on October 1, 2012 of a three-monthconsultation by Nominet, the not-for-profit manager of the .uk infrastructure,into a scheme that would introduce .uk as a top-level domain (TLD). Aftergetting feedback from Nominet meetings held in London on Nov.7and 9 Domainindex.comdecided to change the .uk rating

Currently, over ten million UKdomains are structured as www.anybusiness.co.uk; under the proposal, a competingstructure would be introduced: www.anybusiness.uk. Domainindex has also issued anInvestors Warning for co.uk and .uk TLD, and believes the introduction of the.uk TLD would massively destroy the value of existing .co.uk domains and infact Nominet´s announcement already inflicted harm to the value of .co.ukdomains and the aftermarket as well as the investment climate in the .uk TLD.Our analysis of the proposal, which Nominet defends as a move to increaseInternet Security, would have several adverse effects:

·       The auction of .uk sites would preferentially favor trademarkholders instead of existing domain holders, thereby representing anunprecedented expropriation ofdomain registrants and website of whom most do not own the trademark for theirdomain name.

·       The higher costs of the .uk TLD are in effect an Internet tax for businesses in the UKand especially to domainers as it will raise the cost of holding an inventoryby 800% and will lead to drop of many .co.uk names that until recently haverepresented significant value.

·       The move will create more bureaucracyand red-tape.

·       British companies would have massive rebranding costs.

·       The proposal will create months or years of uncertainty as the issue is litigated in the courts.

We will closely monitor the progressof the Nominet consultation and may issue further rating changes accordingly.

Domainindex also announced thefollowing rating changes in November:

·       .me up from A to AA(because of the good performance of the TLD)

·       .eu down from AA to A(because we expect the TLD to suffer from nTLDs and weak economy in the Eurozone)

·       .info down from AA to A(because we expect the TLD to suffer more from nTLDs)

·       .mobi down from A to B(because we expect the TLD to suffer more from nTLDs)

·       .tel down from AA to A(because we expect the TLD to suffer more from nTLDs)

Domainindex.com is a domain appraisaland benchmarking service. It provides automated and manual appraisal ofindividual domain names and portfolios. Domainindex also provides indices tothe domain industry, tracking the value of each TLD and benchmarking theholdings of large portfolio owners with respect to the markets. Additionally,Domainindex provides ratings for 60 TLDs, rating them by economic, legal andtechnical criteria. Domain ratings are used by large portfolio owners to judgetheir risk profiles and exposures in the various TLDs as well as by lenders todomain owners.