Gerry Harvey to seize control of Tinkler’s farm

Australian entrepreneur Gerry Harvey will call in his debt and seize control of Nathan Tinkler’s farm.

Staff working at Tinkler’s Patinack Farm were told this week that 'the time had come' and that 'Gerry Harvey will be selling us up', the Newcastle Herald reports.

Harvey, the co-founder of retail chain Harvey Norman, is owed millions by former mining magnate Nathan Tinkler.

Harvey verified back in June that he had a caveat over Tinkler’s racing and breeding assets and was considering selling horses that raced in the name of Patinack Farm.

It is understood that more than 550 horses belonging to the farm, including stallions, mares, foals and racehorses, will be up for auction at the end of September.

 

Vin Cox, managing director of the thoroughbred auction company Magic Millions confirmed that Tinkler ‘is getting out of the racing business’.

‘‘This sale is the largest unreserved, private thoroughbred dispersal sale in Australian history,’’ the Newcastle Herald has reported Cox saying.

Several properties will also reportedly go under the hammer including a training track near Cessnock and breeding facilities in the south-east Queensland town of Beaudesert.

The future of Tinkler’s Patinack Farm has been up in the air ever since Tinkler claimed he had struck a deal with United Arab Emirates-based investment company Cibola Capital to sell the business.

But the very existence of Cibola is dubious, with the company’s website perpetually ‘currently under construction’.