BILLIONAIRE retail king Brett Blundy has purchased the Walhallow cattle station aggregation in the Northern Territory for $100 million in what is arguably the largest single cattle station deal in Australian history.
As foreshadowed by The Australian Financial Review in October Mr Blundy, whose wealth is estimated by the BRW Rich List at $1.09 billion, has purchased the one million hectare property on the Barkly Tablelands from Macquarie Group's Paraway Pastoral in a deal the bank could not refuse.
The transaction will set the cattle station market alight as the price paid is back on a par with pre-financial crisis values.
The walk in, walk out deal included 48,000 head of cattle which would alone be worth more than $40 million. The land component is worth $56 million.
Australian businesspeople have been buying into agriculture this year, including retailer Gerry Harvey, former Woolworths boss Paul Simons and a string of billionaires including Gina Rinehart, Andrew Forrest and Kerry Stokes.
Mr Blundy's purchase, which was made alongside pastoralists Adrian and Emma Brown, easily exceeds some of the other major single cattle station deals in the past decade including Peter Sherwin's sale of Alroy Downs and Peter Camm's sale of LaBelle and Welltree.
Both those properties transacted at a price of about $72 million.
Macquarie purchased the aggregation from cattle baron Peter Hughes in 2009 as part of a larger portfolio including Davenport Downs station and Armraynald. That purchase was priced at $169 million.
Macquarie, Mr Blundy and Mr Brown have all repeatedly declined to comment on the record-breaking deal.
