PALACE Pier’s bright start at stud has seen his latest yearlings sell for up to 550,000gns and foals for up to €220,000 so far, making Richard Knight and Salhia Stud’s 100,000gns spend on a breeding right look money well spent on Thursday.

The offering topped the Tattersalls Online November Sale, which saw 92 lots sold for a total of 758,800gns and an average price of 8,248gns. Over 370 bidders registered for the sale, hailing from various countries including Britain, Czech Republic, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Kazakhstan, Romania, Serbia, Spain, Sweden, the USA and the Gulf region.

After securing the breeding right to Palace Pier, Richard Knight commented: “He is a stallion that appears to be on the up and we very much had him in mind for a couple of our mares for this coming season.

“He will also suit a number of our mares going forward, so it made a lot of sense for us to invest in the breeding right.

“We are retiring our first broodmares for this season and so this is the next part of that journey.”

Of this year’s first season sires, Palace Pier was second only to Starman in terms of blacktype winners, group winners and stakes horses. The Dalham Hall Stud sire’s four stakes winners include Lowther Stakes winner and Cheveley Park Stakes third Royal Fixation.

A daughter of Zoustar became the highest-priced yearling sold by Tattersalls Online when bringing 86,000gns from James Tate. A half-sister to two stakes horses, the bay is out of a Group 3-winning daughter of French Guineas heroine Torrestrella.

It was the first occasion that the filly had been offered for sale by Tweenhills, whose David Redvers said: “We were very happy with the price of our Zoustar filly selling online for 86,000gns today, though not surprised as we had plenty of interest in her from when the sale went live.”

Young trainer Charles Weld enjoyed a successful result when selling promising three-year-old Velardo for 62,000gns to Michael Gates of Comfort Park Stud. Bought at Part II of the Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale for €7,000, the Belardo gelding finished fifth on debut at the Curragh in late September and went on to finish eighth of 23 over a mile and a half at the same track.

The most popular wildcard entry from Dan and Grace Skelton’s dispersal from Alne Park Stud was the Grade 3-placed Getaway mare Get A Tonic, who sold to MW for 25,000gns.