Comment

A DAY after the Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale moved on to a new high, the condensed Part II section of the sale followed suit by returning sweeping gains in all key areas.

The decision to cut this part of the sale back to one day paid dividends and the trade witnessed on Thursday was in stark contrast to what took place over the two days last year. At the conclusion of the September Sale finale the turnover came in at just short of €2.1m which was a 12 point improvement on the two-day aggregate from last year.

The average of €10,115 was a 45% progression on 2016, and easily bettered the corresponding figure from two years ago, and the median went from €5,000 to €8,000. Most importantly, the clearance rate also advanced substantially as it went from 65 to 86%.

EXCELLENT FIGURES

A smaller catalogue was always going to help the final figures but, even so, the returns from Thursday’s session were heartening. Last autumn was a tough one for this part of the market but this was much more encouraging and hopefully this bodes well for other similar sales over the coming weeks.

In 2016 Part II produced eight lots that sold for €25,000 or more and that number increased to 11 this week, but the real strength of the sale lay in demand lower down the scale.

In short, the old adage that less is more has seldom rung truer.