Retail investors put in orders for just 18% of the shares made available to the public in Ghazl El Mahalla FC’s mico-IPO when the subscription period ended yesterday after multiple extensions. That means the football club will not be making its debut on the EGX as planned. By market close yesterday, Ghazl El Mahalla had received bids for 17.6 mn of the 98 mn shares up for grabs in the IPO’s retail portion, according to an EGX bulletin.

Refresher: Ghazl El Mahalla was seeking to raise EGP 135 mn by selling a 67.5% stake in the EGX. The club raised EGP 37 mn during the institutional component of the offering in November and had looked to sell 98 mn shares at EGP 1.02 each in the retail portion of the IPO, which had been set to wrap at the start of July but was extended twice due to weak investor interest.

What happens now? In the event that the public portion of the offering wasn’t fully covered, bidders would have one week to decide whether they want their money refunded or if they’d like to remain as private shareholders until the company eventually gets listed, Mohamed Maher, CEO of bookrunner Prime Holdings, told us when we spoke to him recently. The firm plans to wait until mid-2023 before they restart the listing process, he said. “We may change our strategy next time and include a strategic investor,” Maher said. Prime did not return requests for comment yesteday.

It’s a challenging time for new listings: Inflationary pressures, rising interest rates, and a downturn in global markets have all contributed to a steep decline in the EGX 30 this year. Banque du Caire and Aman have both postponed plans to sell shares on the bourse amid a downturn which has left the benchmark index down 15.6% from its recent peak in January.

Don’t let the size fool you: Although tiny, the IPO’s significance was in the fact that it could have encouraged other clubs (namely Al Ahly) to follow suit and go public.