Elice Falls 37% Below IPO Price in Kosdaq Debut Amid AI Infrastructure Doubts

what happened

South Korean AI infrastructure firm Elice Group sank 37% below its IPO price on its Tuesday debut on the Kosdaq market. At 2:10 p.m. Seoul time the shares changed hands at 57,000 won, against an offer price of 90,500 won, theenergymag.com reported, citing Business Watch. The stock had opened at 75,700 won, a 16.4% discount from the start.

The company raised 201.1 billion won, about $150 million. Demand was strong, with institutional orders near 389 times the available shares, retail subscriptions around 408 times and roughly 10.26 trillion won in deposits. The reversal in trading came as investors reassessed the funding needs and returns of AI data-center spending, and after a recent slide in AI-linked equities.

Elice operates in AI cloud infrastructure, cloud services, education and enterprise software, including modular data centers and platforms for managing GPUs. First-half revenue reached 34.4 billion won and operating profit 10.3 billion won, according to its September 30 listing statement.

why it matters

The weak debut comes as other AI-linked listings stall. According to Reuters, Nvidia-backed Firmus in Australia dropped its planned listing this month, and Blackstone-backed AirTrunk delayed a Singapore REIT IPO. Such moves point to cooling appetite for AI infrastructure equities.

market impact

AI infrastructure and new IPOs: weaker demand for sector listings pressures investor sentiment

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