ICANN budget predicts small new gTLD recovery and slowing legacy growth
The new gTLD market will improve very slightly over the next year or so, according to ICANN’s latest budget predictions.
The organization is now forecasting that it will see $5.2 million of funding from new gTLD registry transaction fees in the fiscal year ending June 30, 2019, up from the $5.1 million it predicted when it past the FY19 budget in May.
That’s based on expected transactions being 24 million, compared to the previous estimate of 23.9 million.
It’s the first time ICANN has revised its new gTLD transaction revenue estimates upwards in a couple years.
ICANN is also now estimating that FY20 transaction fees from new gTLDs will come in at $5.5 million.
That’s still a few hundred grand less than it was predicting for FY17, back in 2016.
Transaction fees, typically $0.25, are paid by registries with over 50,000 names whenever a domain is created, renewed, or transferred.
The FY19 forecast for new gTLD registrar transaction fees has not been changed from the $4.3 million predicted back in May, but ICANN expects it to increase to $4.6 million in FY20.
ICANN’s budget forecasts are based on activity it’s seeing and conversations with the industry.
It’s previously had to revise new gTLD revenue predictions down in May 2018 and January 2018.
ICANN is also predicting a bounceback in the number of accredited registrars, an increase of 15 per quarter in FY20 to end the year at 2,564. That would see accreditation fees increase from an estimated $9.9 million to $10.7 million.
The budget is also less than optimistic when it comes to legacy, pre-2012 gTLDs, which includes the likes of .com and .net.
ICANN is now predicting FY19 legacy transaction fees of $49.8 million. That’s compared to its May estimate of $48.6 million.
For FY20, it expects that to go up to $50.5 million, reflecting growth of 2.1%, lower than the 2.6% it predicted last year.
Overall, ICANN expects its funding for FY19 to be $137.1 million, $600,000 less than it was predicting in May.
For FY20, it expects funding to increase to $140.1 million. That’s still lower than the $143 million ICANN had in mind for FY18, before its belt-tightening initiatives kicked off a year ago.
The budget documents are published here for public comment until February 8.
ICANN will also hold a public webinar today at 1700 UTC to discuss the plans. Details of the Adobe Connect room can be found here.
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