Domain name registrar Register.com faces Nasdaq
de-listing for failing to register its annual financial statement on time,
officials said Thursday.
The New York-based company was required to file its annual report, Form
10-K, with the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) March 16. On March
17, the company filed for an extension to the end of the month, but failed
to file the 10-K at that time.
According to Stephanie Marks, a Register.com spokeswoman, the company
intends to appeal the Nasdaq Listing Qualifications Panel by April 12 to
avoid de-listing on April 14. She said the company also expects to file the
annual report by mid- to late April.
For the time being, Register.com’s stock symbol, RCOM, will have an “E”
appended to warn investors.
According to a report filed with the SEC last week, accounting errors were
reported by the registrar’s audit committee and passed to the board of
directors.
Specifically, the restatement “relates to the timing of recognizing deferred
revenues and related expenses, and to the reclassification of certain credit
memos issued in 2002,” according to the SEC filing. As such, the report
noted, all its annual and quarterly financial statements from Dec. 31, 1999,
to the present were not reliable.
Register.com historically recorded transactions using a full-month revenue
recognition convention for domain names bought in the initial month.
Auditors determined, however, that a mid-month revenue recognition
convention is necessary under generally accepted accounting principles
(GAAP), the report continues.
The delayed 2004 annual report will contain financial information restating
that modified revenue recognition made in the past, according to the SEC
filing, an impact that will be “material” in certain cases.