This article is from the Australian Property Journal archive
AFTER months of speculation, UK firm Terra Firm has officially put the Consolidated Pastoral Company on the market, with a record-breaking price tag of around $1 billion speculated for Australia’s largest private cattle company.
CPC’s portfolio includes 16 stations covering 5.5 million hectares, with 400,000 cattle, as well as two feedlots in Indonesia.
Knight Frank and Goldman Sachs are marketing the business as a whole or in parts.
Terra Firma has been speculated to be weighing up the sale of CPC for some time, but it was forced to reveal its hand by Foreign Investment Review Board reforms stipulating cattle properties need to be advertised for 30 days before a transaction with an offshore investor is done.
The UK player purchased CPC from James Packer in 2009, and another rich-lister in Gina Rinehart looms as the next owner of the business.
Offshore buyers are also expected to make a bid for CPC.
The CPC offering will dwarf the previous major sale, which was the S. Kidman and Co.
Rinehart, via Hancock Prospecting, acquired the historic S. Kidman and Co late in 2016 in a joint venture with Chinese group Shanghai CRED for $360 million after Treasurer Scott Morrison had previously thwarted attempts by Chinese parties to purchase the portfolio.
The Kidman portfolio includes pastoral leases over 101,000 sq km and 185,000 cattle.
Perhaps auspiciously, Rinehart last week launched S. Kidman and Co as a branded beef producer.
Originating in 1860, CPC’s portfolio was consolidated as a company in 1983. It is Australian managed but majority owned by Terra Firma, and CPC holds an 80% interest in Juang Jaya Abdi Alasm, which owns and operates the Indonesian feedlots.
CPC’s portfolio includes properties in Queensland, North Territory and Western Australia.
Its sizable Northern Territory portfolio includes breeding stations Newcastle Waters of 445,400 hectares, 230,400-hectare Kirkimbie, and 178,800-hectare Bunda, and the 414,200-hectare Auvergne Station, as well as Newry, Manbulloo, Dungowan and Ucharonidge properties.
Its Queensland properties are headlined by the 256,057-hectare Isis Downs aggregation, and includes the 23,159-hectare Comely and Mapala aggregation, as well as Allawah, Nockatunga, Mimong and Wrotham Park.
Western Australian properties include Argyle Downs and Carlton Hill.
Australian Property Journal
