Tighter margins

The returns from the 2024 yearling sales, when viewed in their entirety, look very impressive. While Coolmore and Godolphin kept their spending at high levels, we had a new big player in the market as Kia Joorabchian of Amo Racing weighed in with over £27 million at Tatts October. The net result was that the average price for all yearlings sold up to and including Goffs Autumn Sale, rose by 12.6% from last year. The average price of £74,349 is the highest it has ever been and is 21.6% ahead of 2020, when Covid affected the price equilibrium.

That said, production costs are also creeping upwards with stallion fees – the main component of said costs – climbing to a new high of £27,216. That’s 3.5% higher than last year, which means that about £920 has on average has been added to the conception fee of each of the 5,165 yearlings sold in 2024 to the end of Goffs Autumn.

It goes without saying that not everyone benefitted from the increased demand at the top of the market. An average up 12.5% while the accompanying conception fees rose by only 3.5% did not translate into profits all around. The number of profitable yearlings after an upkeep fee of £20,000 is applied stood at 1,998 or 39% of the 5,165 sold. That is the first time in four years that this metric had dipped below 40% – it was 41% last year and 42% the year before, admittedly with the unpaid-for Saleh Al Homaizi yearlings included.

It is unsurprising that Dubawi and Frankel top the charts by average price among those with ten or more yearlings sold. At this stage of his career, there is nothing left to prove for Darley’s evergreen Dubawi, certainly nothing in his stud record that would change buyers’ perceptions. However, I wonder if that old age is now playing on the minds of buyers as it was noticeable that only 14 of the 22 (64%) offered found buyers. It should not be a worry as he’s still producing the goods leading all European sires with 24 stakes winners this year headed by the likes of G1 winners Notable Speech. Moreover, he had another nice set of two-year-olds representing him, featuring group winners Ancient Truth and Delacroix.

Frankel, meanwhile, has had one of his quieter years from his horses aged three and up, so much so that he will be relinquishing his Britain and Ireland sires’ title this year. But, just like Dubawi, he’s back with a very good group of juveniles led by three group-winning fillies, featuring the unbeaten triple G1-winning European champion two-year-old filly Lake Victoria. His yearlings, conceived at a fee of £200,000, still produced the highest average price/fee multiple of any stallion with a fee of £100k or more, at 3.8.

Stallions priced up to £9,999

In the sub-£10k category, the runaway winner was Havana Grey, whose current yearlings are from his fourth crop conceived at just £6,000. He’s the only sire below £20k to record a six-figure average price. No fewer than 63 (91%) of his 69 yearlings sold made a profit which makes him the leader among all sires with 15 or more sold. It also goes without saying that his ridiculously high average price/fee multiple of 17.3 is the best in the business.

Stallions priced from £10,000 to £19,999

Nathaniel, who has earned a fee increase to £20,000 for 2025, leads our next group of sires by average price and has also posted the best profit percentage at 73.3%. The highlight of his 2024 season was his G1 Irish Oaks heroine You Got To Me, who comes up for sale at Tattersalls December Sales. Several stallions in this cohort had very good fee multiples, Territories leading the way with 6.6, followed by Nathaniel (5.4), Gleneagles (4.8) and Study Of Man (4.7), plus the best performing newcomer of the group Space Blues (4.1). It is no surprise that the four proven sires above have all delivered G1 winners during 2024.

Stallions priced from £20,000 to £49,999

This category is dominated by Too Darn Hot, Blue Point, Mehmas, and another Dubawi pair in New Bay and Zarak, all of whom produced six-figure averages. Once again it is a Darley stallion, this time Too Darn Hot, that led this group by average price, while another, Blue Point, has the best average price/fee multiple at 5.1. Not only did this pair succeed in adding first-crop three-year-old G1 winners to their resumes, they also achieved further group success with their second-crop two-year-olds, in Too Darn Hot’s case through Fallen Angel and Hotazhell, while Blue Point’s Rosallion added to his juvenile G1 haul and Kind Of Blue was a new G1 winner from his first crop.

Mehmas, meanwhile, smashed his stud companion Kodiac’s single-season two-year-old individual winner world record with his first breed-back crop following his own record-breaking first season. More importantly, the latest Mehmas youngsters feature plenty of classy types, including three G1 winners in Scorthy Champ, Vertical Blue and Magnum Force. His nine two-year-old stakes winners in 2024 puts him right in the vanguard of elite sires of juveniles, behind only Wootton Bassett (13) and Galileo (11).

The metric that has everyone excited about Zarak is his 11.7% stakes winners to runners from mares that managed only 5.7% with all other sires. He’s also added G1 Poule d’Essai des Poulains winner Metropolitan and Zagrey – both new stallions in France for 2025 – to his tally of G1 winners. Little wonder then that he had the best proportion of profitable yearlings of his fee group (80.4%) and an excellent average price/fee multiple of 4.9.

Stallions priced from £50,000 upwards

Among all the stallions in our £50k-plus cohort, it was Night Of Thunder who delivered the best average price/fee multiple at 5.1. Produced at €75,000, the 2024 yearlings by the son of Dubawi were always going to be highly sought after, as he rewarded breeders and buyers by capitalising on the quality of his 2021 crop which delivered his first ever G1-winning colt in the shape of Irish Champion Stakes winner Economics. And his next crop contains two outstanding fillies in G1 Fillies’ Mile heroine Desert Flower, plus the impressive G3 Albany winner Fairy Godmother. The two first-season sires among this group are headed by St Mark’s Basilica with an average profit of £108,686 but Palace Pier struggled a little with just 30% of his yearlings making money after the £20k upkeep fee is levied. We must also mention Dark Angel who, like many speed-orientated sires with a large number of yearlings coming to market, was not as commercially successful as his middle-distance counterparts. Although he netted 2.9 million guineas for his full-sister to champion miler-elect Charyn, out of Futoon, there were so many on the market that just under half made a profit. The same applies to No Nay Never, perhaps the best sire of speedy juveniles there has ever been.