My friend domain name is biggest asset if you ever do business and run any e-commerce site you will understood the value of domain name, we are not talking about 10 char name here.
The trend is reversing first it started with keyword then it moved to brand name and now all startup want short name because it is easy to market , its not something new, yes the price is jumping very quickly not at normal rate that thanks to chinese wherever they dump money they try to control the market.
I scanned all 4l.com(chips) and 5N.com domain name file and majority(my eyes say 90%) registered by chinese, now you think all this 90% going to burn their money , what kind of logic is that, they must have something in their head???
Chinese love to hold the name which creating market shortage so it would be very hard for western companies to get back something in 3l or 4l.com at normal prices because Chinese will not sale for cheap in next 10 year because it going to cost them only $10 each year, which is very cheap compare to other asset maintenance cost like real estate or other products.
Other culture pattern of investment what i have notice is when they buy they all buy or dump money in one particular area or category like Newyork or London or San Francisco real estate market they never go out of it even next near by city real estate is cheap, in domain market they doing same they have bought all 4n.com and 5n.com of course they only going to sale in their country or to their companies but now they focusing on global so started buying out 3l and 4l, since last one year now they almost controlling this category they not going to leave it believe me same like 4n and 5n category.
After this buy out now new domineers join everyday and they feel they not able to touch 4n or 5n or 3l and 4l so they started buying 6n and 7n and so the craze is in front of us, again all non chinese premium 4l would be easily going to reach 1k once the newbie feel they not able to touch the 3k or 5k range so if you have bought at cheap just don't jump out of ship wait you not going to loose anything even market fall , patients is the key in this industry.
I wish my word help someone in 4l.com category and of course correct me if i have wrote anything crazy here.