Tattersalls sale attracts wealth of racing fans
CITY horse racing fans, of which there are no doubt many, may have been following the Tattersalls yearling sale last week with a speculative eye.
This was certainly the case for Bernard Kantor of Investec and Martin Hughes of Cheviot Asset Management, who were both spotted at the old auction house. Tatts, by no means a budget auctioneer by any standards, did particularly good trade by the end of the week, turning over 68,102,500 guineas (£71.5m) – a sum that made it talk of the paddocks as the highest grossing yearling auction in European history.
No pennies, or rather guineas, were being pinched when the hammer came down for one particular horse.
A bidding war between former Manchester United co-owner John Magnier and Sheikh Fahad Al Thani, a member of Qatar royalty, had the bloodstock industry on the edge of their saddles. The colt in question, Hydrogen, was finally won by Sheikh Fahad for a casual 2.5m guineas.
To lighten the mood and lift spirits after the doom and gloom of yesterday’s Black Monday nostalgia, The Capitalist felt it would only be right to share some more joyous news today. And lo and behold, what should wing its way to The Capitalist’s inbox, but an animal study from Japan! Researchers at Hiroshima University have found that showing workers pictures of “adorable, fuzzy, baby animals” makes them more productive. Although never having conducted its own studies within the City A.M. office, The Capitalist cannot help but feel that circulating pictures of kittens and puppies (especially puppies) would achieve about the same effect on productivity as streaming live footage of Felix Baumgartner jumping out of a hot air balloon. That is to say, pretty steep changes, but mostly in the downward direction.