Three-letter domain DOA.com expired, has been involved in an auction and withdrawn

For reasons unknown, someone allowed the domain name DOA.com to lapse, a prime combination of three letters often associated with "dead on arrival."

DOA.com appeared for auction on a certain domain trading platform and within the initial 24 hours, it surpassed $70,000.

Surprisingly, DOA.com was withdrawn from the auction and still displays as an expired domain with parked PPC ads. The landing page shows a banner with its registration status, but the banner doesn't link to the actual auction - instead redirecting to a full page for the Dynadot auction that can't be found.

One can only speculate what might have occurred, but there's a sense that the registrant of this domain might have received notices about the impending expiration of their valuable LLL.com.

Renowned domain investor Andrew Rosener noted that he sold the domain DOA.com for $75,000 "a decade ago."

Registered in December 1997, DOA.com seemed to have been acquired by ACME Billing Co of Oviedo, Florida, in April 2013. Since then, the domain has been owned by that company and its co-founder Martin Krytus; subsequently, it has been under Dynadot's possession.

We reached out to Dynadot to understand why DOA.com was sent to expired domain auction and to assess its ability to renew. Dynadot responded:

[...] Our new policy states that once a domain goes to expired auction, the owner will no longer be able to renew it!

We find it rather harsh to send a domain to expired auction within 30 days after expiration; this seems somewhat hasty for a company that has kept its active domains with Dynadot for over a decade.

The reasons for Dynadot canceling the auction and voiding all valid bids remain unknown.