IslamicFinance.de

A new $50 million fund - the Central Asia Renewable Energy Fund - was launched by the Islamic Corporation for Development of Private Sector (ICD). According to the CEO of the corporation, Mr. Khaled Al-Aboodi, the money will be used to benefit countries of the Caucasus and Central Asia Regions, most important of which will be Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Turkey. Further target countries of the fund include Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Bosnia, Albania and Kosovo. Factors like growing environmental awareness, evidence of climate change, scarcity of fossil fuels, and an increasing commitment by governments to support new sources of energy lead to growing interest in renewable energy in these countries.

Read more on: http://www.abc.az/eng/news_12_10_2012_68763.html

Turkey's Islamic bond market continues to improve after government sold its first lira-denominated sukuk. Major domestic companies are now considering the issuance of their own corporate bonds. The government's sukuk has also lured Middle East investors aiming to diversify their portfolios which could drive the sales of Sukuk-compliant products on Turkish market.

See more under: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-10-03/sukuk-taking-flight-as-airli...

Turkey announced it had raised its sovereign sukuk to 1.62 billion lira as response to a high demand for the two-year lease certificate that attracted an order book nearly five times the issue size of initial 1-5 billion lira.

See more under: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/02/turkey-lira-sukuk-idUSL6E8L23A...

On Thursday Turkish Islamic lender Bank Asya said it had mandated investment bank Is Yatirim for a sukuk issue worth up to 150 million lira with a one-year maturity.

More on: http://in.reuters.com/article/2012/09/27/bankasya-sukuk-idINL5E8KRCSF201...

Turkish Bank Asya considers a sukuk issuance worth up to 150 million lira ($83 million) by the end of the current year. The money gained from the sukuk is to be used for finance investments.

More on: http://in.reuters.com/article/2012/09/25/bankasya-sukuk-idINL5E8KP5EE201...

Standard & Poor’s has rated Turkey's debut $1.5bn Sukuk lease certificates that fall due in 2018 'BB'. The issuance of the Ijarah certificates will be conducted by Hazine Mustesarligi Varlik Kiralama Anonim Sirketi. The assets underlying the lease consist of buildings and land owned by the country. The transaction further allows the state to sells a pool of property assets to the issuer.

More on: http://www.theislamicglobe.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article...

The Co-Lead Manager for the Republic of Turkey's debut $1.5 billion Sukuk is appointed to be Barwa Bank of Qatar. Also, a number of high profile arranger positions for the bank follow the appointment. What is more, Barwa Bank has received following ratings by Bloomberg: sixth in international Sukuk, tenth in global Sukuk, and eighth in MENA region bonds and Sukuk. Since Turkey is believed to be one of the most prestigious issuers in emerging markets, it is a further testament for the bank to be apointed by them.

More on: http://www.cpifinancial.net/news/post/15819/barwa-bank-appointed-co-mana...

The issuance of Turkey's first sovereign sukuk this week marks a shift in the government's policy. For ten long years Tayyip Erdogan's government backed away from Islamic finance in order to maintain state secularism. However, the sukuk will help the country to large amounts of money from Islamic investment funds and will become a benchmark for the pricing of future Islamic bond issues in the Turkish private sector. Further development in the offered Islamic financial products is expected.

More on: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/19/turkey-islamic-finance-idUSL5E...

With the participation of a couple of major international banks, Al Baraka Turk Participation Bank has signed anIslamic finance deal worth $450 million making this a record. 32 banks from 16 countries are included in the facility. Among them are Standard Chartered Bank, Noor Islamic Bank, ABC Islamic Bank and Emirates NBD. Nominations for mandated lead arrangers are announced: Bank Islam Brunei Berhad Darussalam and Al Hilal Bank.

After the initial announcement that the Turkish Treasury has mandated Citigroup, HSBC and Liquidity Management House (LMH) to inspect existing opportunities for a Lease Certificate issuance, it turns out that the mandate aim to advise and structure Turkey's proposed debut sovereign Sukuk Al-Ijara. In this context, a number of investor meetings in significant financial centers in the Middle East and Asia are organized and will take place until Thursday.

According to a statement by the Undersecretariat of the Treasury in Turkey, Citigroup, HSBC and Liquidity House have been mandated to investigate opportunities concerning the issuance of a Lease Certificate in the international capital markets. For this purpose numerous road shows for the Sukuk are planned and will be held in financial centres across the Middle East and Asia. The show will take place in the period 10-13 September. The Sukuk is supposed to be dollar-denominated and issued in the week of 17 September.

After almost a decade of preparation works, Turkey makes the next step in its Islamic bond plan. Citigroup, HSBC and Liquidity House of Kuwait are mandated to examine opportunities for sukuk issuance. The expectations are that the government will be able to gain a profit of up to $1bn through the sukuk. Also, the sukuk is likely to bridge the funding gap in the country's budget deficit target of 1.5 per cent of gross domestic product for 2012.

Nine months ago Al Baraka Banking Group cancelled the debut sales of sukuk due to very high yields. Now that the situation has turned and Al Baraka Turk Katilim Bankasi again considers its previous intentions. It plans to offer $250 million (Dh917 million) of seven-year dollar-denominated sukuks this year.

Istanbul Real Estate Investment Trust Is REIT signed a Murabaha facility worth $50 million in a syndicate with a number of GCC banks. The facility has a two-years tenor and a profit rate of LIBOR +250 bps. Playing different roles, banks included in the syndicate are Qatar Islamic Bank, Barwa Bank, First Gulf Bank, and Mashreq Bank. Sole Bookrunner and Structuring Advisor to Is REIT was QInvest .

The Turkish AV Havalimanlari Holding announced a consortium including TAV secured $1.2 billion in Islamic financing for Medina Airport. The financing facility was secured from Arab National Bank, The National Commercial Bank and The Saudi British Bank.

Albaraka Türk has authorized a number of leading banks to arrange a a $250 million dual-currency syndicated finance facility. This facility shall be used for the expansion of Albaraka Türk's financing activities in Turkey. The tenor of the facility is one year and its profit rate is of 200 bppa over the Libor/Euribor. Among the participating banks are ABC Islamic Bank, Al Hilal Bank, Bank Islam Brunei Darussalam Berhad, Emirates NBD Capital, Noor Islamic Bank and Standard Chartered Bank.

Murabaha Financing Facility (the "Facility") was launched into general syndication inviting numerous banks world-wide to participate. Among them are ABC Islamic Bank (E.C.), Al Hilal Bank PJSC, Bank Islam Brunei Darussalam Berhad, Emirates NBD Capital Limited ,, Noor Islamic Bank PJSC and Standard Chartered Bank (together the "Initial Mandated Lead Arrangers" and the "Bookrunners"). Together with Albaraka Türk Kat?l?m Bankas? A.?. ("Albaraka Türk"), a US$ 250 Million equivalent Dual-Currency was arranged. Albaraka Türk will use financing under the facility in order to expand its financing activities in Turkey.

S&P Indices made an anouncement that a new Index will be launched due to increase in the demand for a shariah-compliant benchmark in Islamic countries. The new S&P/OIC COMCEC 50 Shariah Index will measure the performance of 50 leading Shariah-compliant companies from members of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). Eligible countries and territories for the Index are: Bahrain, Bangladesh, Côte d'Ivoire, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Malaysia, Morocco, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.

Aproximatly 100 investment projects worth 300 billion roubles have been introduced at the 4th International Summit in Kazan.
The organizers of the forum were the government of Tatarstan, the Islamic Business & Finance Development Foundation (IBFD) with the support of the Federation Council of Russia.
The summit is attended by thousands of guests from over 30 countries of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation including: Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Egypt, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Morocco, Turkey, the UAE, Oman, Pakistan.

The OIC Ministers Responsible for Water embraced the OIC Water Vision at the conclusion of their Conference which was held in Istanbul, Turkey, from 5 to 6 March 2012.
The host of the conference was the Ministry of Forestry and Water Affairs of Turkey. Attending at the conference were the Ministers Responsible for Water, Deputy Ministers, senior officials, OIC institutions, observes and relevant international organizations.
The OIC Water vision gave a framework for cooperation among the OIC countries for overcoming the common and major challenge of maximizing the productive use of water and minimizing its destructive impacts.