.mobi The Risk of .MOBI?

[yoyosean]

I have seen on this forum and other forums this theory that the .MOBI bubble is going to burst and the risky investment of .MOBI and I am thoroughly confused. Perhaps somebody who thinks this way can shed some light.

I trade stocks for a living and at any one point in time will have $300,000 to $400,000 dollars including margin at "risk" in the market, I do this to exploit small moves in the market and make a .25 cent to .50 cent move in the stock there are Billions of dollars at any single time in the stock market doing this. Now, I buy lets say 400 domain names for $20 each or $8000 and the .MOBI bubble bursts and the domains are worthless are worth reg fee, what have I lost? $8000 or nothing, or somewhere in between? Is that risky?

Now lets say .MOBI is wildly successful and to be ultra conservative IMHO, my names (which I believe to be great), are worth on avg. $200 each. I have turned $8000 into $80000 and made a 900% return on my investment. I dont get how the risk reward ratio is anything but in the favor of the people regging .MOBI domains or even buying them for good prices in the aftermarket, can someone please poke holes in my theory because I dont get it.

 

[mykel241]

The risk is more for those who choose to just park their mobi names as opposed to developing. If people would develop their mobi names with a sound mobile based business models then the risk would greatly be reduced as the model itself is TLD independent and could thrive with any TLD.

Michael

 

[yoyosean]

i agree but even if they are parked what are you really risking? a $19.00 reg fee per name? I dont know where everybody else lives but $19.00 barely buys you two drinks in downtown san diego if you are out for a night.

 

[Jeff]

I trade stocks for a living and at any one point in time will have $300,000 to $400,000 dollars including margin at "risk" in the market, I do this to exploit small moves in the market and make a .25 cent to .50 cent move in the stock there are Billions of dollars at any single time in the stock market doing this.

Most domainers - particularly newer ones - don't have this type of capital, IMHO. How long have you been a day trader, by the way? :gl: :talk:

Now, I buy lets say 400 domain names for $20 each or $8000 and the .MOBI bubble bursts and the domains are worthless are worth reg fee, what have I lost? $8000 or nothing, or somewhere in between?

$8,000, at current registration costs, for every two years ... in other words, it's a recurring charge correct? :blink:

Is that risky?

Yes, extremely ... but again, it's relative IMHO. Obviously, someone with a lot of capital can afford more bolder investments & risks. The average domainer investor does not enjoy this level of financial comfort, generally speaking ... thus, the undeveloped .MOBI domain presents is "risky", in my view.

I have turned $8000 into $80000 and made a 900% return on my investment.

Is this a hypothetical ... or have you actually realized these $'s and %'s? :talk:
Thanks, and Best of Luck to all .MOBI folks!
-Jeff

 

[seanboy]

The risk is more for those who choose to just park their mobi names as opposed to developing. If people would develop their mobi names with a sound mobile based business models then the risk would greatly be reduced as the model itself is TLD independent and could thrive with any TLD.

Michael

I agree 100%. The greatest threat to the success of .mobi are the investors themselves.

 

[satsdifference.com]

I Agree

Yes,

This makes me wonder if I should have thousands myself.

I have not seen a better ground floor business opportunity in my life I am believing.

Even the aftermarket for good names I say, if you have money, you can make some steal grabs now. 15 weeks old and on fire!

But right, $19.. and that's for two years, $8.99 a year at the cheapest places is exciting

(But of course one has to land as many good names as can)

Happy whois,

WorldRadio.mobi

 

[mykel241]

You are correct in many ways but if you also develop some of your names then you are only helping to secure the success of the extension as well as your portfolio. With this being an infant TLD and most people parking names, or in some cases even worse their names are not resolving to nothing, then most people will never use the TLD and instead default to .com.

<opinion>Content is king and .mobi does not have much content yet to draw people to start using it. I feel that mTLD needs to do more to secure their is ample mobile content to ensure the success of the extension. As it stands currently they could just sell their held names now, make a very nice profit and do nothing further for the TLD except let it collapse while we are holding all worthless names and they are laughing all the way to the bank.</opinion>

Develop more... Park less...

Michael

I agree 100%. The greatest threat to the success of .mobi are the investors themselves.

Exactly.

And people should only reg names that makse sense for the extension.

Michael

 

[yoyosean]

I have been a "day trader" since 1997, dont like to call myself a "day trader" but thats ok.

I have not realized the gains that you were addressing it was purely hypothetical.

Yes it is a recurring charge but I can promise you one thing, if I dont see significant movement across the .mobi front by the time my reg fees are due I will be dumping my names for pennies on the dollar. The way I see it is if they have not accomplished a significant amount of traffic and sites by Oct. 2008 .mobi will be a failure. IMHO.

I am not talking about risk from the standpoint of whether or not you can "afford" to take the risk. I am merely talking about the risk reward ratio of the .MOBI extension as it relates to other potential investments.

I.E. If you can only "invest" $200 and you regged 10 outstanding .mobis your risk reward of that $200 is much greater investing in the .mobi TLD instead of the stock market of which you may be able to buy 2 share of stock in something and IF it goes up 100 points or a stock goes from 100 - 200 (extremely rare) you have doubled your money whereby you sell your .mobis for $38 vs. the $19 you paid and you have doubled your money. Much more logical IMHO to invest in the ext. than the stock market with little capital.

 

[namewaiter]

risk is relative

if you invested $8,000 and $8,000 was all you had then high risk - if it's play money then low risk.

edit (just saw you latest post) : the risk level will change with the direction of .mobi popularity .... the more popluar .mobi becomes the lower the risk of .mobi registrations

 

[mjnels]

betcha there will be a lot of .mobi drops come 2008.

Thats when its time for me to go into bottom-feeding mode.. i dont know if .mobi will be anything great by 2008 but something tells me that isnt very long and some people will say screw it, dropping their crap, mediocre, and even some good names.

 

[hawkeye]

In any extension that has been released so far, good, short, specific generic names sell and get sold. Maybe not comparitively to other extensions, but there is a market for such. Cars.biz would/did? sell! And yes yoyo, you do have good names in your portfolio, and won't lose money if mobi fails. A lot of those comments on bad investments in my opinion are directed to the other 97% of names that aren't 'A' type names and would have no chance of selling if it were to fail. Just because a dictionary word is open, doesn't make it a fit for it's extension, and we've all seen more than enough of "wtf you thinking?" names. Also I think there is a lot of pessimism towards this extension, and inner hidden hopes that it does fail, so they won't have to face a fear of - "I missed the boat? Me?, ..an experienced domainer!??"

 

[yoyosean]

I agree with the drops, but you have to agree that if .mobi doesnt have a huge amount of traction by then, then the tld will not succeed. This is not a slow moving market.

This is much different than other tlds in the fact that .mobi only has to compete with .com in the mobile space IMHO, therefore the amount of traction, traffic and brand awareness that it SHOULD be able to develop by Sept. of 2008 should be significant if not than it has no other arena to succeed. Due to the fact that the tld is useless on a PC.

 

[Jeff]

betcha there will be a lot of .mobi drops come 2008.

Thats when its time for me to go into bottom-feeding mode.. i dont know if .mobi will be anything great by 2008 but something tells me that isnt very long and some people will say screw it, dropping their crap, mediocre, and even some good names.

IMHO, you can bet dollars to donuts this will be the case ... with very few exceptions! Really, it highlights the importance of registering good, meaningful, developable domains that will nicely fit into the "ecosystem"!

Just my two sense.
-Jeff

 

[gou]

You can eliminate risk by playing with house money or substantially reduce risk by getting close to it.
It's easier to manage risks with .mobi compared to security investments.

 

[scandiman]

Yoyo, in your case as an entry level .mobi investor, you are in a great position. Most of my names were bought at reg fee, about 50/50 before and after land rush. So I average about $40 each invested. The names I have bought after-market are where the risk starts to come in. I spent $1300 for a particular name in December so I could corner the market on a particular search term in the .mobi space. That was a risk that I think was worth taking since the estimated monthly search volume for the domain(s) is almost 500,000 / mo. and is relevant for travelers. It may take me over a year of ad revenue to recoup my investment. Only time will tell.

Many are shopping the after-market looking to flip domains and have no dev interest. That is their choice but they are the ones I think are playing with fire. Buying an after market Word-Word.mobi in hopes of flipping it is way too risky IMO. It is almost questionable at reg fee.

A risk I recently took was buying UPK.mobi here from a fellow NPer for $250. It is urban shorthand for Ugly People Kissing (which the seller noted but I already knew) and I intend to develop it into a site where kids with more time than sense will upload their cell phone picts of their friends (or enemies) making out. It is an experiment. The seller made a healthy return on their investment. Way better than any stock or mutual fund out there. I congratulate the seller on making a good business deal. I hope to generate income from the site, maybe I will, maybe I won't, But I haven't plopped too much money into the risk. If it is profitable, I will easily earn back my investment. But I wouldn't have risked $25,000 on this experiment, even though this could possibly create that kind of return if successful. Emphasis on possible.

Will flowers.mobi provide $200,000 in income to the owner? Well developed I think it is very promising. Similarly I think a developed Invest.mobi should pay the future owner handsomely. Someone has opted for that risk at $10,000 and we will see on Wednesday at Sedo if others are willing to risk more.

I like your business-like approach to the concept of risk in this business, many more should adopt it.

 

[Jeff]

I have been a "day trader" since 1997, dont like to call myself a "day trader" but thats ok.

Day trader! :p

I have not realized the gains that you were addressing it was purely hypothetical.

What have you realized for gains thus far in the .MOBI? :talk:

Yes it is a recurring charge but I can promise you one thing, if I dont see significant movement across the .mobi front by the time my reg fees are due I will be dumping my names for pennies on the dollar. The way I see it is if they have not accomplished a significant amount of traffic and sites by Oct. 2008 .mobi will be a failure. IMHO.

Agree, and there are MANY many that will be dumping [/i]similarly[/i] within two years time ... you can count on it, IMHO. :music:

For the rest, again ... "risk" is relative, and it would seem you could afford more than the average domainer, in my humble opinion.
Just some thoughts, and all the best (whatever the level of risk)!
-Jeff

 

[000]

I've currently got ~$4500 invested in .mobi, and to me that's a lot of money. But I'm willing to take the risk, because I've thought it all through extensively and really don't think that there's much chance that I'll lose a lot considering my purchase prices and the nature of my investments. Even if .mobi completely flops, my LLL.mobi's in particular are a rather safe investment imho. As yoyosean pointed out, .mobi is a better investment than most other options, and I truly believe that it will succeed.

This industry is often all about risks, and I'm not willing to just sit back and watch what happens with .mobi from the sidelines. I want to have a part in the action, and no matter what happens I don't think I can really, honestly regret that wish.

 

[yoyosean]

ahhh my realized gains is confidential, you should know that Jeff : ), I have taken some "risk" capital off the table, and have used those sells to acquire more names. So my average cost per domain is shrinking rapidly : ) If I can get my average cost per domain to $2.00 I will be pretty happy. That way if I have to sell names for $50 i still make an outstanding ROI. If you know what I mean : )

I dont generally agree with your assessment that risk is relative. It is relative in terms of dollars invested but that is it. Of course you have to "invest" or take "risks" within your means, but in my opinion if you are trying to get ahead you have to take risks and IMHO if I only had $1000 to risk I would rather do it here than anywhere else that I can think of at this moment.

 

[Jeff]

I've now spent $38.50 U.S. total on the ".MOBI" ... and with developments starting in the Spring, I feel very confident with my personal level of risk, IMHO. :gl:
I fully realize that I could lose $38.50 + $40.00 (renewals until year 2010), and I'm willing to accept that ... others, I'm sure, can feel just as confident at even higher levels!

... IMHO if I only had $1000 to risk I would rather do it here than anywhere else that I can think of at this moment.

I prefer the dog track, but that's just me ... :red: :kickass:

Just my two sense.
-Jeff

 

[yoyosean]

ahhh, knew the non .mobi believer in you had to come out at some point. : )