- Surplus IPv4 address inventory can be monetised via leasing, generating recurring revenue while retaining ownership.
- Leasing versus selling decisions affect balance sheet treatment and financial strategy due to the scarcity and ongoing demand for IPv4 addresses.
IPv4 scarcity turns dormant inventory into financial relevance
The exhaustion of the global free pool of IPv4 addresses has transformed this basic network resource into a scarce, tradable asset. With only about 4.3 billion IPv4 addresses possible and no new pool available for general allocation since 2011, address scarcity remains a persistent structural feature of Internet infrastructure.
For enterprises or service providers holding more IPv4 addresses than they actively use, this scarcity underpins real economic value. What was once an internal technical inventory item now warrants strategic financial consideration. A 2024 industry analysis observed that IPv4 address blocks often function as hidden assets with significant monetisation potential, yet they frequently go unrecognised in corporate planning.
Unlike physical assets, IPv4 addresses are accounted differently in corporate financials, and many firms historically did not list them explicitly on balance sheets, partly because they were acquired at no cost in earlier Internet eras. Today, the value of surplus addresses can be unlocked without relinquishing ownership by leasing them to third parties in secondary markets.
Also Read: IPv4: The digital real estate of the 21st century
Leasing as recurring income and balance sheet choice
Leasing unused IPv4 address space allows enterprises to retain the underlying asset on their balance sheet while generating recurring income. According to leasing market participants, this approach can yield substantial financial upside compared with outright sale, because leasing keeps the asset’s long-term option value intact and spreads revenue over time.
For example, Orion Telekom — a Serbian telecom operator — leveraged a specialised IP address marketplace to monetise idle address blocks. Over a period of ongoing leasing activity, Orion generated approximately $400,000 in revenue from addresses that were not required by its active service operations. This income stream emerged with minimal operational overhead and allowed the company to retain the option to reclaim addresses if future demand increased.
The choice between leasing and selling — or between leasing and continued internal use — has direct implications for how IPv4 address resources appear in financial reporting. Income from leasing contributes to operating revenue, while ownership of under-utilised address blocks may be recognised as a long-term intangible asset whose value may appreciate as scarcity persists.
Also Read: Why CFOs, not just CTOs, should care about their IP inventory
Balancing strategic inventory with financial strategy
Decisions about IPv4 inventory are not purely technical. They involve trade-offs between cash flow timing, asset retention, and strategic flexibility. Enterprises with surplus IPv4 space must weigh whether immediate capital from sale outweighs the potential for ongoing income through leasing and possible future appreciation of address values.
As one analyst observes, the availability of structured leasing markets represents a way to reconcile the technical reality of a depleted IPv4 ecosystem with financial planning, turning dormant inventory into a recurring revenue model without forgoing ownership in an uncertain future.
