$31 million-plus price tag for Italian family’s NSW cattle farm

An Italian banking family has listed a 2734-hectare NSW New England farm for sale, offering the last of its agricultural assets in Australia.

An Italian banking family has listed a 2734-hectare NSW cattle station for sale, the last of its agricultural assets on Australian shores.

The Trabaldo Togna family is selling the St Aubyns Station, located in the NSW New England region, 33km south of Walcha and regarded as a significant breeding and fattening enterprise suited to sheep and cattle.

The Italian family has owned St Aubyns Station since 2003 with the property forming part of its larger Australian agricultural investments dating back 45 years.

The cattle station is owned by COFI SA, the family’s Luxembourg-based holding company, through which the Trabaldo Tognas have purchased a number of significant NSW farming properties.

“The investment in the Australian rural industry by COFI SA dates back to 1979 when Glenrock Station (30,000 hectares), located at Scone and Buddah, Narromine, were acquired,” COFI SA vice-president Massimo Trabaldo Togna said.

“My family, coming from the textile industry in Biella, was long acquainted with Australia and its high-quality wools.

The Trabaldo Togna family’s COFI SA are selling St Aubyns Station.

“Personally, I soon took charge of the Australian investments on behalf of COFI. In the following years, we first sold Buddah, an irrigated property planted with cotton and orange trees and subsequently sold Glenrock in 2006.”

The deal for Glenrock Station was struck with a Babcock & Brown syndicate for $23 million, before later selling to China’s Dashang Group for $45 million in 2020.

Offers worth $31 million-plus are expected for the St Aubyns Station, via expressions of interest closing December 4, through Inglis Rural Property.

The core of the Trabaldo Togna family business is private banking, with one operating in Italy and another in Switzerland.

St Aubyns Station has a history carrying up to 1400 cows and followers in an enterprise turning off weaners to local calf markets for further backgrounding off-farm.

Under current management, St Aubyns is conservatively carrying 800 breeders and followers with progeny carried through to heavier kill weights over 18 to 20 months under a grass-fed finishing program direct to Woolworths.

The property features highly productive chocolate and red basalt soil types, with the country

ranging from arable fodder cropping country to open rolling slopes and selected areas of native timber.

St Aubyns Station features a network of permanent waterways, spring-fed creeks and a network of 54 dams. There is also 9km of frontage to the Tia River that encompasses the eastern boundary of the property plus frontage to three creek systems.

Accommodation includes four houses including the St Aubyns Station homestead, which is a four-bedroom, two-bathroom weatherboard home set in established gardens.