Menegazzos' Miranda Downs takes cattle station listings to $700m
The combined value of big cattle stations listed for sale across northern Australia has surged to almost $700 million after the Menegazzo family put its 438,000-hectare Miranda Downs station in Queensland’s Gulf of Carpentaria up for sale, along with 55,000 head of cattle.
Price expectations are between $145 million and $155 million for the renowned property’s rolling term lease, livestock cattle station complex and 6000-megalitre water licence from the Gilbert River, which runs through it.
The former Financial Review Rich Listers join the likes of mining magnate Gina Rinehart and North Star Pastoral’s Colin Ross in selling premium assets in a market where demand for grazing properties is red hot, beef prices remain near record levels and returns from premium grazing assets hit 30 per cent last year.
Mrs Rinehart put a $300 million portfolio of stations from her Hancock Agriculture and S. Kidman operations up for sale in March while Mr Ross’ North Star Pastoral is selling Limbunya and Maryfield stations in the Northern Territory for more than $150 million.
Miranda Downs is one of eight cattle stations owned by the Menegazzo family’s Stanbroke Pastoral, one of the world’s largest privately owned integrated beef companies.
Stanbroke grazes 200,000 head of cattle across 1.6 million hectares. Its beef products are produced at its Lockyer Valley processing facility and exported to more than 35 countries.
The late Queensland cattle baron Peter Menegazzo took full ownership of Stanbroke via a $417 million deal in 2004. He and wife Angela died in a plane crash in NSW in 2005, and Mr Menegazzo’s children took over the business.
Bruce Douglas, of Ray White, is the selling Miranda Downs via expressions of interest closing in early June.
Meanwhile, 300 kilometres north-west of Cairns, former Australian Agricultural Company director Nick Burton-Taylor has put the 211,664-hectare Bellevue Aggregation up for sale, along with a 10,000-strong herd of brahman-cross cattle, with an asking price of about $35 million.
The property, which has a carrying capacity of 15,000 livestock and is renowned as a “calf factory”, comprises Bellevue Station and Nychum Station.
Mr Burton-Taylor, who is looking to crystallise his investment after a long period of ownership, said Bellevue Station offered powerful breeding capacity and operational scale in a district likely to benefit from climate change.
LAWD agents Col Medway and Danny Thomas have been appointed to take Bellevue Aggregation to market.
Mr Thomas said “extraordinary prices” were being paid for cattle stations amid record beef prices and growing global demand for Australian produce.
He said the likely buyers would be cashed-up local producers.
“The buyers for Bellevue could be any number of wealthy existing beef processors looking for a bolt-on property, as they look to go all the way up the supply chain,” he said.
“These businesses have low gearing and strong cash positions, and they can borrow long-term money on interest rates with a two in front of them.”
Local beef producers are also expected to show interest in another Queensland cattle property, 9300-hectare Berrigurra, near Blackwater, west of Rockhampton, which the Queensland government will take to market next month.
The property was used by the former Emerald Agricultural College to train students in cattle production before the state government shut its network of agricultural training colleges in 2019.
Industry experts estimated Berrigurra could be worth between $30 million and $50 million.
