Prices dip near English sale's end

Prices slipped across the board Thursday as the final sessions of the Tattersalls October yearling sale, termed Book 3, began in Newmarket, England. The first of three days' selling in that portion of the auction produced a $149,940 session-topper, a Mtoto colt that Alex Greaves purchased from Highclere Stud's consignment.

The session-topping colt will enter training with the buyer's husband, Yorkshire trainer Dandy Nicholls. The bay colt is out of the Shaadi mare Bunting, making him a full brother to the listed stakes winner and multiple Group 1-placed Mot Juste and a half-brother to another listed winner, Parasol.

Trainer John Gosden was underbidder on the colt, whose price in the local auction currency was 70,000 guineas.

The session sold 203 yearlings for a gross of about $7,943,607, down 13 percent from last year's total for 181 horses. The average price of about $39,131 was a 22-percent decline from last season's equivalent session, and the median of about $32,130 was down 25 percent.