Camaraderie Abounds Ahead Of Unusual Easter Sale

New South Wales, the Australian state with the highest number of confirmed coronavirus cases, was placed into lockdown on Tuesday, with residents warned they could face a fine or jail time if they leave home without a good reason.

Fortunately for the nation's yearling sale market, inspections for the virtual Inglis Easter yearling sale on Apr. 7 and 8 has been deemed a good enough reason.

Newmarket-based bloodstock agent Johnny McKeever has been Down Under since January-partially by design, partially by circumstance-and earlier this week he was working through his second round of inspections on Hunter Valley farms, having been on the road for two weeks.

“We are allowed to drive from farm to farm to do the inspections,” he said. “We are allowed out, which makes a difference. If I was a lawyer I'd just be told to sit in my office or home and not move, but because it's our job to get out and see the horses it's ok to be out on the road.”

While the Hunter Valley is a quiet place at the best of times, McKeever said it is now a virtual ghost town.

“There's nothing open here,” he said. “Coffee shops are open-you can buy a coffee or get a takeaway somewhere, but that's about it. Ninety-nine percent of restaurants are just shut. From a small population of about 24-million, one million have already lost their jobs in the last week. It's pretty devastating.”

After the government placed strict bans on mass gatherings, Inglis announced on Mar. 26 that its flagship Easter Yearling Sale would be conducted partially online on Apr. 7 and 8, with the remainder of the yearlings set to be offered at a tentative traditional auction on July 5. Perennial leading vendor Arrowfield Stud promptly pulled all 64 of its yearlings from the sale to instead offer privately, and there have been plenty more withdrawals, but a number of key vendors have stood strong and McKeever reported a real sense of community around keeping trade turning over.

“The market is bound to be pretty depressed,” he said. “But I've seen a hell of a lot of nice horses. There will only be about 20 or 30 major lookers I'd think, ie. the major racing operations, managers and some bloodstock agents and a few trainers who have managed to get away. So the word has to get around about what is a nice horse; if you're going to spend A$200,000 or A$300,000 on a yearling most people want to see it once or twice. To bid online on something you've never seen at all for that kind of money, it's going to be a challenge I think.”

McKeever advertised on Twitter on Mar. 24 that he would share information on his inspections free of charge, and Inglis has kept a running list of agents and trainers that have been on the road.

“Myself and a lot of other agents, we've all rung each other up saying, 'have you gone to this area or that area? We didn't manage to see that farm, did you?'” McKeever said. “Everyone's kind of saying, 'yeah, this horse is worth looking into, that horse is worth looking into.' A lot of agents are helping each other, sharing their information, not worried about getting money out of it but just trying to get deals done.”

Vendors have pulled together too, with New South Wales nurseries accommodating sellers from Victoria, Queensland and further afield to stable their yearlings and allow them to be inspected.

“Some of the Victorians and Queenslanders have managed to get their yearlings into New South Wales, so that's really why we're now doing a second trip, to see those that we missed because we couldn't get out of state,” McKeever said. “They are allowing out of state travel, but it was just a bit impractical to go down to Victoria for two days to see 20 horses.

“We've been quite lucky. We've managed to see practically the whole book from New South Wales. We have about 30 or 40 more horses to look at then we've done everything that could be done. Obviously we've not seen the New Zealand ones, as they're on total lockdown there; the people aren't even allowed to leave the farms. Some have withdrawn and some are going to try online, but I don't think they're very hopeful. It's going to be too difficult. It'll be very tough.”

Online auctions have actually been a mainstay in Australia for a number of years now, but those offerings have typically been restricted to horses in training, breeding stock and the like. Participating in a yearling sale online is completely uncharted territory for all involved, including McKeever.

“All I've ever done in the past is wave a book at an auctioneer,” the agent admitted. “I have bought the odd thing online, like a filly with a bit of pedigree for very small money. A lot of people are very dubious about how the online thing will work, but it has to work because it's the only method they have of having the auction.”

“The Inglis guys have been absolutely fantastically helpful overall in this,” McKeever added. “I have a particular guy who said he's going to give me a tutorial on how it works and I think a lot of the agents are in the same boat. But the Australians are slightly more technical than we are up in England, I think. I don't think there will be too much of a problem. It's just the fact that people can't physically see the horse in front of them. We've all looked at horses on videos and it's difficult to get that feeling off the video as opposed to when you're physically standing next to it.”

McKeever said he expects the challenges of the online format to lead to the kind of polarization that those in the Northern Hemisphere are so familiar with.

“The word will go around on the star horses; the experts will have seen them and they'll be well checked out and they'll continue to sell well,” he said. “But if a horse is a bit incorrect and doesn't get great inspection notes, those might be the ones that are very hard to sell because you can't grab someone and say, 'come down and look at my filly. I know she's a little offset but she's a great sort.' None of that is going to be able to happen. Getting your sale done after not getting your reserve in the ring is going to be very difficult to do. I suspect the sellers will set very realistic reserves. Nobody really knows because it's a first for everyone.”

While the depressed general economy is likely to affect trade too, McKeever said those in a position to spend could find themselves in a good position.

“I reckon there's going to be some great bargains,” he said. “That's one thing I've been telling people: even if you think you might be out of the market, you may not be. There will be people from the internal market, like breeders who may be well-off who need to replenish on broodmares; there are some fillies with huge pedigrees in the catalogue and they could be much cheaper this year than they normally are.”

McKeever advises a number of clients based in Hong Kong, and he said it will be a positive for the Australian market that racing in that nation has soldiered on.

“They're a very important market for the Australians and the fact that their racing is still going, we hope that will give a bit of backbone to the sale,” he said.

Racing remains on the go in Australia, too, albeit like Hong Kong and other venues around the world, behind closed doors.

“We're very lucky here that we have racing in Victoria and New South Wales still going,” McKeever said. “That has been a great help. The Australian government seems to be very supportive in keeping the industry going as much as we can as long as we're virus-free, which touch wood we appear to be at this moment in time, but that's very delicate. Everyone has been awfully careful and I think it's going as well in the circumstances as it could possibly go.”

McKeever has certainly not been vacationing during his extended stay Down Under, having done deals on 29 yearlings already since arriving in January, and he said his trip is going to be extended a bit longer. But with no racing on in Europe, he is in no hurry to rush back to Newmarket.

“It's all up in the air,” he said with regards to his travel plans. “We had a flight but it was cancelled, and my wife doesn't want to travel anyway because she would be a high-risk category and she doesn't want to sit in an airplane for 24 hours. So we're going to hang in here and see how we go. We're stuck, but we love Australia, so being stuck here is not a big hardship.”