Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Encouraging mixed-sale season
This week’s Fasig-Tipton Kentucky winter mixed sale marked the close of the mixed auction season in North America, and the final chance to pick up a broodmare before Kentucky breeding sheds open for business early next week. A little more than a decade after the recession of 2008, which rocked the Thoroughbred bloodstock industry, the mixedauction category posted a generally positive season, with signs of an active middle market and a diverse buying bench.
The broodmare segment of the marketplace is typically dominated by end users – those who intend to make a continued investment in the horse – as opposed to pinhookers, who develop horses, typically younger ones, for a resale profit. Broodmares represent a long-term investment, with roughly 11 months gestation before producing the foal; a period raising and preparing the resulting foal before it can be raced or sold as a weanling or yearling; and overhead costs on both horses. Because of this, a strong demand for broodmares can indicate optimism for the health of the industry in coming years. This is especially true when the mares are being purchased by middle-market buyers, as opposed to wealthy buyers in the upper echelons who are buffered from market whims or external factors.
“I think some people are now re-entering or willing to buy broodmares that might not have been willing to do so three or four years ago – not just at the top end, but at the $25,000 to $50,000 level, which is encouraging, and provides some stability into the marketplace,” Fasig-Tipton president Boyd Browning said at the conclusion of the February sale on Tuesday. “I think people now have a high level of confidence to replenish their broodmare bands and to add or start a broodmare band.”
Fasig-Tipton launched the mixed-auction season in strong fashion last November with its Kentucky fall selected mixed sale, which amassed record gross receipts and strong average and median figures. It was led by $7.5 million champion Lady Aurelia. The bellwether Keeneland November breeding stock sale, which began a two-week run the following day, finished with declines in economic indicators but showed signs of a buoyant upper and middle market, with a gain in average prices for Books 1, 2, and 3 and a steady buyback rate until reaching the bottom of the sale, Book 7. The Keeneland January mixed sale then posted its best gross since 2008, a record average price, and a median that spiked 67 percent. That sale was led by champion Abel Tasman, who sold for a sale-record-tying $5 million.
“With Abel Tasman, we kind of anticipated that Day 1 would be up from last year,” Keeneland’s director of sales Geoffrey Russell said. “But then you take her out and it was still up, considerably. It’s just been really strong.”
Fasig-Tipton’s February sale concluded Tuesday with 327 horses sold for total gross receipts of $9,659,400. The gross represented a 7 percent decline from the 364 horses sold for $10,436,800 in two sessions last year.
The cumulative average price was $29,539, finishing 3 percent up from the $28,673 in 2018. The median rose 43 percent, to $15,000 from $10,500. The cumulative buyback rate finished at 20 percent, an improvement in a selective market compared to 23 percent last year.
Led by Grade 2 winner Cheekaboo, who sold for $300,000 to Japanese interests during Monday’s opening session, a total of six horses fetched $200,000 or more, going to six different homes.
“There was a great range of buyers,” Browning said. “There was no ‘market-maker.’ . . . It does show you some strength and spread and the broadening of the market.”
The mixed auction season also features young horses, and there was a strong appetite for weanlings at the November sales. Mandy Pope went to $1.9 million at Fasig-Tipton November, a record for a weanling at the sale, for a Pioneerof the Nile filly out of Breeders’ Cup Distaff winner Stopchargingmaria. With the demand for weanlings, buyers indicated that they expect the 2019 yearling sale season to again be solid, following a strong 2018. The boutique Fasig-Tipton Saratoga selected yearling sale finished with a record gross, record-tying median, and its second-highest average. The bellwether Keeneland September sale also finished with a record average price.
Bob Elliston, Keeneland’s vice president of racing and sales, said in November that pinhookers often fuel the weanling market, but that’s not necessarilly the case this season.
“We’re seeing a lot of end users buying weanlings, because they probably understand how hard they are to get bought in the September market,” he said. “So they’re trying to get in here.”
That demand continued into the January and February mixed sales, with competitive bidding on yearlings.
“I think what happened on the short yearling side, I definitely believe that pinhookers didn’t fulfill their orders in November, so they had no choice but to be here in January,” Russell said.
Browning said that the strong weanling and yearling markets also can increase confidence in the broodmare market, as buyers have an increased chance of profiting on their purchases’ offspring.
“There’ll be a lot of mares sold this week that their first foal will pay for the mare and then some,” Browning said. “There are some, obviously, that won’t – we’re dealing with Mother Nature.
“But it’s no longer a complete gamble. You can say, ‘If I have a good foal, I’ve got a pretty good chance of [breaking even].’ So the economics are making a lot more sense from a breeder’s perspective than they were five years ago.”