After months of rumours, it appears that the much speculated upon public listing by Pokerstars is off.
The Independent reports that the world’s second-biggest online poker company after PartyGaming, has shelved plans for a GBP 1.6 billion (Euro 2.3 billion) London flotation until early next year.
Bankers at HSBC and Dresdner Kleinwort had been working towards bringing Poker Stars, which is 75 percent owned by the Israeli Scheinberg family, to investors in the spring.
A flotation is not now expected until 2008, if at all. PokerStars, which moved its operations to the Isle of Man last year, had previously worked with the investment bank NM Rothschild on a possible sale to a rival tht did not materialise.