Bill's Columns

Everything about the thoroughbred business is a pretty high-risk gamble, we know that; but of those who invest in the breeding and auction sales sector of the business, pinhooking 2-year-olds must be about the highest-risk gamble of all. At the March 27 Fasig-Tipton Gulfstream 2-Year-Old in Training Sale, fewer than one-third of the horses catalogued (59 of 187, 31.6%) were listed as sold; but those 59 which did sell grossed $29,115,000 – a 24% rise from 2018 – and averaged a spectacular $493,475, an increase of 28% over last year’s sale.

In the inaugural Fasig-Tipton 2-year-old sale at Gulfstream, in 2015, 89 two-year-olds, 50.9% of the 175 catalogued, grossed $20,095,500, and averaged $225,792. Since then the gross has increased by 45% and the average has more than doubled – but the number sold is down by 34%, and the clearance rate from the catalogue is down by 38%. Boyd Browning and his team at Fasig-Tipton have once again done a great job of catering to the very top of the market, but they’d be the first to concede it’s a very small market.

The same year, 2015, when Fasig-Tipton moved to Gulfstream, the Ocala Breeders’ Sales Co. expanded its March 2-year-old sale from one to two days of 300 horses catalogued per day, so to a sale where roughly 600 two-year-olds were catalogued. In 2015, OBS March saw 326 horses sold for $55,432,000, an average of $170,037. This year 313 sold for $44,718,500, a drop of 19% from 2015 (though 6% higher than last year), and averaged $142,871, which is 16% lower than the 2015 average.

OBS sold 56 more two-year-olds in March than last year, a near-10% improvement in the clearance rate from the catalogue, from 44.9% to 54.2%, so the two sales combined had 372 juveniles sell, 17% more than in 2018. The gross for the two sales totalled $73,833,500, a 12% gain from last year, while the combined average dipped by 4%, from $206,824 to $198,477.

Of course the biggest 2-year-old in training sale is the OBS April Sale, scheduled for April 23-26, which catalogues over 1,200 horses, of which they’ll be hoping to sell around 700 of them, gross $70-million, and average $100,000. Last year there were 1,222 catalogued to OBS April, of which 698 sold (57.1% of the catalogue), averaging $98,474. That is by far the biggest single two-year-old sale – about 30% of the entire North American/European two-year-old auction marketplace – so at least as much as the boutique Gulfstream sale, OBS April will tell us a lot about the health of the broader market for 2-year-olds in training. But what the Gulfstream sale did tell us is that there is still plenty of competition, and very if not astronomically strong competition at the top.

Out of 372 horses sold there were a total of 21 sires which had three or more sell and average $200,000+ according to a table first published under Eric Mitchell’s byline in the March 29 edition of Blood-Horse Daily (p. 22). Nine of the 21 are first-year sires, headed of course by Ashford’s American Pharoah, whose eight 2-year-olds to sell so far have averaged $610,625. Darby Dan’s Sky Kingdom, a dual G3 winner at 1 1/2m by Empire Maker, had a blockbuster $875,000 colt catapult his average to $335,667. The same firm’s Tapiture had four for an average of $285,000 at OBS March. WinStar’s Carpe Diem comes next, with an average of $261,667 for six sold.

With the $3,650,000 saletopper Curlin of course leads all sires on average with three or more sold, the average standing at $1,671,667. Tapit – who is having a scorching strong season – has had three average $933,333, while Medaglia D’Oro has three averaging $783,333. American Pharoah ranks fourth among all sires, while rounding out the top five is Into Mischief, who had eleven 2-year-olds average $516,818. Since he has been having crops averaging 140 horses rather than 35, like he started with, Into Mischief has proven a remarkably consistent top-class sire, both on the racetrack and at the sales.