Keeneland Powers On

Keeneland September Yearling SaleThe Keeneland September Yearling Sale (the world’s biggest racehorse auction) continues to show remarkable strength after eight days, which is just past the midpoint of the 15 day sale. The best indicator of the overall health of any sale is undoubtedly the median (figure that half the horses in the sale exceeded in price) and this has risen a very respectable 11.1% to $100,000 after 1983 yearlings have been sold.

The gross and average are both down slightly but this difference can be entirely explained by the lack of a mere handful of yearlings priced between $3million and up on the opening two days. Even so the median for the first two days barely moved from last year indicating the depth and strength of the market. Gross is just over $340 million ($365plus last year, down 6.9%) while the average is $171,488, down 5% from $180,460 last year.

Please note the statistics below are for the FIRST SEVEN DAYS ONLY

Keeneland first seven days in $US
year	no sold	gr.	avg.	med.
2001	1610	234,127,500	145,421	62,000
2002	1710	188,801,100	110,410	60,000
2003	1690	247,770,500	146,610	75,000
2004	1712	285,729,700	166,898	90,000
2005	1775	339,659,000	191,357	95,000
2006	1729	349,955,500	202,403	100,000
2007	1697	324,091,200	190,979	120,000

Considering the recent jitters on Wall Street caused by the subprime crisis, Keeneland September cannot be viewed as anything other than a resounding success. Worldwide bloodstock markets do tend to strongly follow trends in the stock market, and the bigger than expected cut in rates just announced by the US Federal Reserve should help to shore up confidence on Wall Street.

Laurie DippenaarThe new confidence in financial markets following this move by the Fed in the USA, spilled over to the JSE yesterday (which was up by 3% plus,) and the Rand showed renewed strength to be selling at R7,14 to the Dollar this morning. First National Bank’s Chairman, Laurie Dippenaar (a Summerhill customer since the gate’s first opened) announced arguably the best set of results in the Bank’s recent history, the surest reflection of the rude health of the local economy.

Extract by Andrew Reichard Daily Stallion Bulletin 20th September 2007