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National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) announced the launch of the "Thahabi Ijara Fund VI", an Islamic Sharia-compliant investment fund in US Dollars, designed specifically to meet the needs of its Thahabi customers for low risk investments that generate a consistent monthly income and which satisfy the requirements of local and international Sharia boards.

NBK's Assistant General Manager, Consumer Banking Group, Adel Al Jenaee, commented, "The introduction of Thahabi Ijara Fund VI is a result of the great success and demand for our Ijara Fund series, which are proof of our commitment to bring to market high quality, low risk funds."

Press Release

Today sees the launch of a new Journal on Islamic finance from dedicated Islamic finance media entity Yasaar Media.

The Journal, called So Far – the Journal of Strategic Thinking in Islamic Finance, is written and edited by members of an Islamic finance Think Tank and is modelled on traditional academic journals. The difference with So Far is that the members of the Think Tank are predominantly practitioners rather than academics.
Member of the Think Tank are drawn from the ranks of committed Islamic finance professionals around the world and range from the Gulf and the Far East to the USA and Europe.

Each issue of So Far is dedicated to a single topic of core importance to the Islamic finance industry – and the launch issue looks at the thorny issue of the problems facing the Sukuk market. Unlike many other journals So Far is distributed free in PDF format and is available from a variety of sources including Yasaar Media thus guaranteeing maximum readership and exposure.

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As part of Taageer's efforts to spread its geographical presence, the company has made its first investments in Sudan along with one of the major founder promoters of Taageer (The Arab Investment Company). The most important aspect of the investment is that Taageer would be adding value to Sudan operations by providing Technical and Management consultancy during the first three years of operations. The Arab Leasing Company Limited, which falls under the supervision of the Central Bank of Sudan, is considered to be a leading institution in the field of finance leasing in Sudan. The company, registered in Sudan, specialises in finance leasing activity with its head office in Khartoum, with a paidup capital of US $30 million.

The leasing market in Kuwait is the most active in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region which abounds in companies leasing autos, furniture, and other goods but sees little activity in the sector

THE Ministry of Finance issued $68 million worth of sukuk in two separate floats between November and December, bringing the total sold to more than $2 billion. The Ministry of Finance had completed the successful pricing of its 40th and 41st issuances of short-term Sukuk Al-Ijarah securities.

Full news of the about the issuance of the sukuk is available at the link given below.

The Financial Times produced a special looking into the Future of Islamic Finance.

The download is free of charge.

Yasaar media published a new report called Islamic Finance in North America 2009 for free download, which is co-published by Codexa Capital, UM Financial Group, King & Spalding, and Doha Islamic.

According to the report Islamic finance in North America has developed along two quite separate paths:

• The first path focuses on retail Islamic finance and centres mostly on home financing products and credit cards.

• The second path involves a number of high profile GCC-based Islamic investment banks and their deployment of hundreds of millions of dollars in private equity and real estate developments in North America.

Read the full report for free at the link below.