8 minute read
Turning the dial
Bid spenders Amo Racing, Yulong, Sumbe, John Stewart, John Sykes and Mike Repole between them spent around €100 million at 2024’s European bloodstock sales breeding stock sales.
Jocelyn de Moubray takes a look at the figures from the breeding stock and foal sales
MORE OFTEN THAN NOT it is the Tattersalls October Book 1 Yearling Sale which sets the trend for the major European bloodstock sales for the next 12 months.
This year’s edition may not have been quite as strong as some of the headlines suggested, in real terms turnover at the 2024 edition was less than 2022, but demand at both October 1 and October 2 was strong and far better than most vendors had expected.
It was very obvious to everybody involved that demand was going to be strong for the best foals on offer at Tattersalls, Goffs and Arqana, as well as for the best racing fillies and broodmares.
And so, of course, it was. The Goffs November Sale set the trend for the remainder of the European foal sales.
The aggregate and average prices were up from 2023 by 29 per cent and 31 per cent respectively, but, on the sale’s two lesser days, 301 foals were sold for an average price of €19,300, up by five per cent from 2023, while on the two stronger days 353 foals were sold for an average price of €75,200, up by 37 per cent from 2023.
The strongest demand was at the top of the market, which was headed by the Sea The Stars colt out of Ambivalent sold by Baroda Stud to Godolphin for €1,000,000.
Aside from Godolphin, the biggest buyers were the established pinhookers –Tally Ho Stud, Stauffenberg Bloodstock, Lynn Lodge Stud and Yeomanstown Stud, while 13 of the 14 foals who made more than €250,000 were colts. The only filly among the top lots was the Lope De Vega half-sister to the stakes-winning two-year-colt Jungle Drums bought by Newtown Anner for €450,000.
The Tattersalls and Arqana sales both produced, in real terms, the second-best aggregate of all time behind 2022
The advances in the aggregate and average price were greater at the Tattersalls December Foal Sale with the final figures being up by 46 per cent and 52 per cent respectively.
However, the results followed a similar trend with the 450 foals sold on days one, two and four returning an average of 28,000gns, up by 13 per cent from 2023, while 194 foals were sold on day three for an average of 159,000gns, up by 66 per cent on 2023.
Certainly a good market all round for foals, but only a boom one at the very top.
A total of 41 foals were sold for more than the equivalent of €250,000, and 21 fillies and 20 colts. The fillies included the top lot, the Frankel full-sister to Chaldean sold to Amo Racing by Whitsbury Manor Stud for 2,500,000gns, and they were probably all bought to race rather than to be reoffered for sale as yearlings.
Of the high-priced fillies, Willingham purchased four and Amo Racing and Sumbe three each. Overall, between them, Amo and Willingham spent nearly eight million guineas on foals at the Tattersalls sale, nearly 20 per cent of the aggregate.
The top-priced colt was the Sea The Stars out of Angel’s Point sold to M.V. Magnier by Genesis Green Stud for a million guineas. After years in which his progeny appeared to be undervalued by the market, Gilltown Stud’s Sea The Stars has become a top commercial sire.
His 13th crop of yearlings in 2024 sold for an average price of more than 300,000gns, his best yearling average to date, while the foals from his 14th crop averaged more than 400,000gns.
Frankel was the leading European sire by average price – 1.1 million guineas for five sold, followed by Sea The Stars, Night of Thunder, Wootton Bassett and the leading first-season sire Baaeed whose eight foals averaged 240,000gns.
It is more difficult to compare breeding stock sales from year to year as the quality of the horses on offer is not consistent –for instance, there were twice as many Group 1-winning fillies or mares on offer in 2022 than in 2024
But there is no doubt that demand was very strong for those considered to be top class, particularly for fillies and mares still with racing potential rather than broodmares in-foal.
Of the 34 horses who made the equivalent of 600,000gns or more at the three major sales only 11 were mares in-foal, and one a broodmare not in-foal.
This is a relatively new ratio as back as recently as 2019 in the pre-covid era, ten of the 18 highest-priced lots at the breeding stock sales were in-foal mares.
The Tattersalls and Arqana sales both produced, in real terms, the second-best aggregate of all time behind 2022 when the market was led by the Group 1 winners Saffron Beach, Alcohol Free, Malavath and Sweet Lady.
The top-priced in-foal mare was the 13-year-old Tres Magnifique sold by Gestüt Etzean to M.V. Magnier at the Arqana sale for €1.4 million carrying a sibling to the Group 1-winning filly Tamfana and an own-sister to the now three-year-old Areion filly The Palace Girl.
She was sold as a two-year-old at the Tattersalls December Sale for 1,550,000gns to John Sykes’ Woodford Thoroughbreds after finishing second on her only start to date in a maiden at The Curragh in October.
Etzean received its reward for developing this family over three generations and having sold Tamfana and The Palace Girl as yearlings at the Baden-Baden September sale for only €20,000 and €30,000.
Since covid the market has swung from good years to poor years, but has looked, above all, to be unstable and dominated by the stallion owners
Tamfana, herself, would surely have been the highest-priced lot of all if her owner Quantum Leap Racing had put her through a sales ring in 2024.
The sales were led by the three-year-old Classic-winning fillies You Got To Me and Sparkling Plenty, sold to Amo Racing and Magnier and partners for the equivalent of €5.8 million and €5 million followed by the Group-winning two-year-old Vertical Blue sold by the Teboul family’s Gemini Racing to John Stewart’s Resolute Bloodstock for 3,200,000gns.
This was the second remarkable sale in three years for the Teboul family and its agent Paul Nataf.
In 2022, they sold the Group 1 winner Sweet Lady, who was bought for €100,000 as a yearling at Arqana August, for €2,050,000 at Arqana, while the €50,000 yearling Vertical Blue made nearly €4 million only 18 months later.
Young Group 1-winning fillies with racing potential have always been worth a great deal of money, but, aside from The Palace Girl, there were several other remarkably high-prices for fillies in training with the Group 3 winners Caught U Looking, Village Voice and Excellent Truth making 1,800,000gns, 1,300,000gns and €1,600,000.
The best-bred filly foals and the best young racing fillies on the market are suddenly worth a whole lot more.
The European bloodstock industry had almost ten years of consistent growth between the financial crisis of 2008 and the covid crisis of 2020.
Since covid the market has swung from good years to poor years, but has looked, above all, to be unstable and dominated by the stallion owners who have prospered during the good years.
Last year several new players at the top of the market emerged, who appear to be as keen on winning races as on competing in the stallion market.
Amo Racing, Yulong Investments, Sumbe and the Americans John Stewart, John Sykes and Mike Repole spent around €100 million at European bloodstock sales in 2024, with close to half of this figure spent by Amo.
A hundred million is enough to move the dial and, for the time being anyway, top class racehorses, as well as those likely to produce them in the future, are worth more than ever.
Or, more accurately, more than at any time since the early 1980’s when the first Middle Eastern buyers drove the market upwards.
