IslamicFinance.de

For many years we see in the media experts believing in inflation and even hyper inflation. However, in the same time we face proponents warning against deflation. So far we all noticed.

Only a about a week ago I read an article by Myret Zaki clarifying that unfortunately inflation and deflation co-exists.

Myret Zaki's thesis is that we face inflation on financial markets, and deflation in the real economy (in French):

http://www.bilan.ch/myret-zaki/redaction-bilan/inflation-et-deflation-co...

In my view there is a general major shift in the price matrix and I still try to figure the magnitude and implications thereof. It is a bit irritating as at University we learned about neutrality of money:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutrality_of_money

This means any extra supply will increase prices equally, 5 % more money, all prices going up 5 %. Pretty plausible at first hand. However, it seems it does not work in reality any more (or never did).

Dar Al Takaful has announced today that it has opened a new managed investment account with Daman Investments.
According to Mr. Saleh Al Hashmi, Managing Director of Dar Al Takaful, Daman Investments is one of the most venerable companies in the MENA Investment Arena and this is the start of a mutually beneficial business relationship. Mr. Shehab Gargash, Managing Director of Daman Investments, said that Dar Al Takaful is a respected Islamic Insurance company and opening this new managed account demonstrates their confidence in his firm's abilities to manage money in the UAE economy. Dar Al Takaful’s account will be managed under a Shari’ah compliant investment mandate.

Assets held by the takaful sector in Brunei recently have grown significantly while those of conventional types of insurance have been declining, the monthly report from Brunei's monetary authority AMBD showed. In the year ended Sept. 30, takaful assets rose 21 percent to 425 million Brunei dollars ($336 million). Conventional insurers saw a drop of 1.3 percent in assets during the same 12-month period. At end-September, Brunei's takaful market accounted for 33 percent of total insurance assets. Although insurance assets have seen rapid growth in Brunei in the past decade, industry players say there is still poor awareness about insurance among its population. Brunei has four takaful operators.

U.S.-based MetLife will buy 51% stake and 49% stake in AmLife Insurance Berhad (AmLife) and AmFamily Takaful Berhad (AmTakaful), respectively, from Malaysia’s AMMB Holdings. The remaining parts of the firms will be owned by AMMB. The deal, worth $249 million, will help MetLife to expande its reach into the Southeast Asia insurance markets. The proposed transaction follows recent announcements from New York-based MetLife of the formation of a joint venture with Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam and opening of a representative office in Myanmar. The deal is subject to regulatory approval.

Pak-Qatar Family Takaful Limited is a progressive and a technology-driven Shari'ah Compliant company providing Takaful solutions in Pakistan. Beginning operations in 2007, the company has an independent Shari'ah Advisory Board chaired by Mufti Muhammad Taqi Usmani which certifies all products and operations for Shari'ah compliance. The company is rated A (having Stable Outlook) by JCR-VIS Credit Rating Co Ltd. The paid-up capital of Pak-Qatar Family is in excess of Rs 700 million. Pak-Qatar General Takaful Limited is chaired by Sheikh Ali bin Abdullah al-Thani and sponsored by several financial institutions form the State of Qatar. The company is present in all major cities of Pakistan, and is on track to further expanding its branch network.

There are big opportunities to promote Islamic finance in Tunisia which can be the global hub of Islamic finance for French speaking countries, said Muhammad Zubair Mughal, Chief Executive Officer, AlHuda Centre of Islamic Banking and Economics (CIBE) in an international conference on “Finance and Enterprise” in Tunisia. He also said no Islamic financial institution was effected by the global financial crisis. He added that Tunisia has a good recognition in Islamic financial industry having 2 full-fledged Islamic banks, takaful companies, universities with Islamic finance program, sukuk laws and some other similar institutions which indicate the best future of Islamic finance in Tunisia. Realizing the need of Islamic microfinance, he further said that Islamic microfinance is missing component of Islamic finance in Tunisia while socioeconomic development and poverty reduction can be done in better way through Islamic microfinance.

Indonesia plans a new law that will require the spin-off of the sharia-compliant units of insurance companies. The move could reshape Indonesia's takaful market by spurring mergers as firms try to meet capital requirements for their full-fledged Islamic units. A draft law is now with parliament but won't be enacted this year as previously anticipated. It covers all areas - licensing, market conduct, corporate governance, consumer protection - for both takaful and non-takaful firms. The law is expected to give three years for insurers to comply with requirements to spin-off their Islamic units. Minimum capital requirements for full-fledged takaful firms would be set at 50 billion rupiah , compared with 100 billion rupiah for conventional insurers. Passing Indonesia's insurance law would close the last market that allows takaful windows to operate, helping develop the country's nascent Islamic finance market.

Great Eastern Takaful aims to be profitable by end-December and be among the top three players in the local takaful business, according to Chief Executive Officer Zafri Ab Halim. The company has registered growth which was mainly attributed to improvements from its corporate agency and bancatakaful channel. Great Eastern Takaful will continue growing its agency distribution via direct and dual agency as a key distribution channel as well as develop and launch products catered primarily for the Muslims' market. The joint-venture company between Great Eastern Holdings Ltd unit, I Great Capital Holdings Sdn Bhd and Koperasi Angkatan Tentera (M) Bhd, yesterday changed its status from a private to a public entity in line with the requirement of the Islamic Financial Services Act 2013.

Moody's Investors Service has today assigned a first-time Baa2 insurance financial strength rating (IFSR) to Damaan Islamic Insurance Company "Beema" (C.Q.S.C.) ("Beema "), based in Qatar . The rating was assigned with a stable outlook. The rating reflects Beema's good market position, strong growth potential and a lower-risk investment portfolio. Furthermore, Beema has demonstrated good underwriting results that have led to a growth in consolidated equity. Business diversification and product risk, considering the modest size of Beema, is also considered strong. However, offsetting this is the relatively high concentration Beemadisplays in terms of its geography. Furthermore, the financial and total leverage have increased materially in recent quarters.

Dubai Holding, a conglomerate owned by the emirate's ruler, and Kuwait's Al Fajer Re plan to launch a Emirates Retakafulfirm with $500m of authorised capital in January to tap unserved demand in retakaful. The new firm, Emirates Retakaful, will be set up in the Dubai International Financial Centre, said Fareed Lutfi, director of insurance services at Dubai Holding. There will be scope to add more investors to the firm, he added. Emirates Retakaful will focus on covering general takaful business, such as oil- and aviation-related risks, and later explore family takaful risk.

Bank Negara Malaysia’s (BNM) recently announced concept paper on life insurance and family takaful (LI and FT) may be the insurance sector’s re-rating catalyst. The proposals made in the paper focus on ensuring sustainable operating costs, enhancing disclosure and improving policyholders’ value proposition, which should collectively boost penetration, especially in the mass market. Key measures in the recent proposals include the introduction of the minimum allocation rate to replace commission/operating cost limits on investment-linked products, promoting distribution channels and encouraging greater product transparency with enhanced disclosure requirements and web aggregators. The outcome is considered a win-win for customers and insurers.

Takaful Oman Insurance, one of Oman's first takaful insurance providers and still under formation, has announced its initial public offering (IPO). The promoters are offering 40mn shares, each priced at 102bz - with a par value of 100bz and 2bz of issue expense. The IPO, which opened for subscription on October 30, will close on November 28. Takaful Oman is promoted by ONIC Holding, National Investment Funds Co ( Nifco ), Oman Investment Corporation (OIC); National Bank of Oman, Blue Door Investment Services LLC, bank muscat, and T'azur Takaful insurance company, one of the top five takaful companies in Kuwait.

The 2nd Annual Islamic Banking Summit Africa (IBSA 2013), which opened today in Djibouti, saw more than 350 leaders in the international Islamic banking and finance industry engage in discussions that focused on capturing the growth opportunity for Islamic finance and Takaful in Africa. The inaugural session of the two day event assessed the progress and development of Islamic finance in Africa and discussed required key government and regulatory initiatives. The keynote plenary session discussed key strategies for capacity building and how to best position Islamic finance as a catalyst for a new wave of economic development in Africa. The Power Debate session discussed key initiatives to strengthen Islamic finance’s links to the real economy in Africa and connect Africa to the broader world of Islamic finance.

General and family Takaful companies are soon going to withdraw their constitutional petition against the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP), 23 conventional insurance companies and the federation of Pakistan after a prolonged fight with the regulator to restrict competition in the Islamic insurance industry. Takaful operators are said to have struck a deal with their conventional insurance counterparts, which will allow the latter to run Shariah-compliant insurance business through parallel window operations. Some of the biggest players, including State Life, EFU Life, Jubilee Life and Adamjee Life are reported to be eager to launch their Islamic window operations. In fact, some of these companies have vowed publicly to launch window operations within three months of the lifting of the SHC’s restraining order.

Dear Reader,

IslamicFinance.de is still edited by myself, Michael Saleh Gassner. In the same time the website became part of the family's publishing house, Al Kitab.

Myself I moved to Geneva for professional reasons, working as Islamic private banker. IslamicFinance.de remains to be a private passion.

Best regards,

Michael Gassner

London's Shariah-compliant start-up Cobalt Underwriting has now written its first risk, via its agreement with capacity provider XL Group, to cover the deal to acquire a high-profile property portfolio. It has underwritten a property acquired by PARC Property Holding, advised by Amiri Capital, to acquire Park Crescent West. Cobalt CEO Richard Bishop believes the agreement serves to demonstrate that insurance should have a place at the forefront of the government's plans to promote Islamic finance in London. Furthermore, he reminded Islamic business leaders that insurance capacity that meets their needs is available in London.

The Tunisian Islamic insurance company "El Amana Takaful," set up as part of a Tunisian-Saudi partnership project, came into service on Wednesday. This Islamic insurance company operates with paid-up capital of TND 10 million ($6.3 million). Saudi businessman Mr. Hassan Salem Al-Amari was appointed as the chairman, and Hussein Al-Daghri was named the deputy chairman. The company was licensed in April. Most of its shareholders are conventional insurers, including Comar, Astree, and Carte – each with 18% share – and Tunis Re, with a 6% stake.

The European Union has lifted sanctions against Iran Insurance Company following defense presented by the corporation, its Managing Director Javad Sahamian said. The sanctions caused that letters of credit guaranteed by the company were refused by others, but after ease of sanctions the company can work actively in insuring LCs in areas such as freight. Sahamian said the corporation has managed to control sanctions considerably to prevent any great loss and pave the way for more growth.

The Saudi Arabian and Malaysian cooperative and Islamic insurance (takaful) markets are the only two that are seeing growth especially in new policies and profitability, according to the report 'Global Takaful Insights 2013' by Ernst & Young. Too many operators are pursuing an insufficient number of risks to increase their gross written contributions (GWC). The Saudi Arabian Monetary (SAMA) directed all insurance operators in the Kingdom to align with the cooperative insurance model. Saudi Arabia is the single largest Islamic insurance market in the world. Meanwhile, Malaysia has emerged as the world's largest family (life) takaful market, with a proven model and regulatory clarity. In the near to medium term, traditional growth markets, including Saudi Arabia, UAE and Malaysia, continue to ride on favorable market conditions and a young demographics structure, the report concludes.

The Board of Directors of Daman Islamic Insurance Company (Beema) has approved the financial statements of the Company for the nine months ended September 30, 2013. Announcing the financial results, Beema Chairman Sheikh Jassim bin Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabor Al Thani said the Company’s net profit has crossed QR40m during the period, up 111 percent compared with the same period last year. Income from investment increased 154 percent during the period. The premium collection of the company recorded more than QR160m, up 24 percent, compared with the corresponding period in 2012. Sheikh Jassim noted the portfolio of shareholders recorded 119 percent growth in the profit against the same period of 2012.