Quick question - if they "pay" themselves, for the registration, then "refund" themselves when they sell it on, does that violate the RAA?
That would be pretty transparent. Note that last clause which to me specifically forbids speculative registrations. 3.7.4 Registrar shall not activate any Registered Name unless and until it is satisfied that it has received a reasonable assurance of payment of its registration fee. For this purpose, a charge to a credit card, general commercial terms extended to creditworthy customers, or other mechanism providing a similar level of assurance of payment shall be sufficient, provided that the obligation to pay becomes final and non-revocable by the Registered Name Holder upon activation of the registration. Registering a name and holding onto it for possible resale at an inflated price, like some registrars do with "premium" names, is one thing, but for NSI and register.com it is quite clear that their intention is to sell a domain before they have to pay for it, and that they refund the unsold ones to avoid paying. R's, John