Verisign has published a performance report on the second quarter of 2017 on its official website. Net income was assessed at $130 million, which is 11 million more than in the same period last year. The overall number of domain names in .com and .net reached 144.3 million. The increase over last year was 0.8 percent, or 680,000 domain names in absolute numbers.
Contrastingly, the renewal rate for .com and .net has fallen to 72.5 percent from 74.4 percent in the second quarter of 2016. Verisign President and CEO Jim Bidzos, however, is content with the results, listing the renewal of the agreement with ICANN among major business highlights, pursuant to which Verisign will remain the sole registry operator for the .net registry through June 30, 2023. It also gives Verisign the contractual right to a price increase for .net which the company will exercise as soon as February 1, 2018 when the annual renewal fee will go from $8.20 to $9.02.
