The book provides a complete analysis of European bloodstock sales in 2024 for all foals, yearlings and older horses in Britain, Ireland, France, Germany and Italy. It also includes foals and yearlings either foaled in Europe or by European-based sires at the major auctions in North America and Japan.

Furthermore, the Bloodstock Sales Review features comprehensive overviews of the trading year for Tattersalls, Goffs, Tattersalls Ireland and Arqana, as well as tables of the leading sires of 2024 by yearling average, lists of the year’s most expensive yearlings and foals, and a roll of top historical auction prices.

To mark the publication of the book, we compiled a top ten of the most profitable British and Irish-based yearling sires last year.

We have worked out each sires’ profitability index by dividing their 2024 yearling average by their covering fee of 2022, when the offspring in question were conceived.

In first place...

Havana Grey

2024 yearling ave: 85,395gns/€103,114

2022 covering fee: £6,000

Profitability index: 14.94

Rags-to-riches sire Havana Grey takes the top spot for the second year in a row, and by a huge margin again. He also gives Whitsbury Manor Stud the first and second most profitable sires of 2024, which pays tribute to the value on the Hampshire operation’s roster.

The son of Havana Gold, who has supplied 37 black-type runners including Group 1 performers Vandeek, Arabian Dusk, Jasour, Shouldvebeenaring and Havana Cigar, had 90 lots sell for 85,395gns (€103,114), nearly 15 times his covering fee of £6,000 in 2022. There was no end of big paydays for vendors, with 21 of his yearlings fetching six-figure sums, led by a full-brother to Cornwallis Stakes winner Rumstar sold by Longview Stud to George Boughey for 500,000gns. 

Havana Grey will find it harder to maintain his position as the most profitable yearling sire in Britain and Ireland this year, as this crop is the result of him covering at an increased fee of £18,500 on the back of his freshman exploits. There is a good chance he can do it, though, as he keeps delivering on the track and it was widely agreed that his price rise in 2023 wasn’t as steep as it could have been.