IslamicFinance.de

In order for firms from the UAE to enter the largest economy in Europe, a mission was launched in partnership with the German Emirati Joint Council for Industry and Commerce (AHK).
Leading firms from the UAE's sector followed this mission with the purpose to connect the participants with potential opportunities in Germany and to show he high level of expertise in the area in Dubai.

Kuveyt Turk Participation Bank (KTPB) has set the tone by venturing abroad into Germany, Dubai, Bahrain and Kazakhstan and by pioneering new products based on physical gold and exporting them to markets in Malaysia and elsewhere through the global network of KFH. These include gold-backed exchange traded funds (ETFs), gold-backed banking accounts and sukuk. Ufuk Uyan, CEO of Kuveyt Turk Participation Bank has been at the forefront of the expansion of KTPB, taking it to the top 10 tier of Turkish banks. Here Ufuk Uyan discusses with Arab News the state of the participation banking sector in Turkey, the performance of KTPB in 2010 and the prospects and challenges for the industry in 2011 and beyond.

This up to date research summary by Funds@Work provides snapshots of their 2nd network analysis in the Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) space which took 10 months to complete. All institutional investors/asset owners are kept anonymous, the results of this short summary however are eye-opening for all market participants who want to get an idea of the state of socially responsible investments in countries like Germany, Switzerland, and Austria. The Austrian institutional investors who are part of this research and were identified as socially responsible investors (partially or fully managing their money in a sustainable manner) have 11,01 billion EUR AUM, the German investors altogether 510,13 billion EUR AUM, and the Swiss ones 214,56 billion EUR in AUM, amounting to 735 bn. EUR AUM altogether of which roughly 360bn. EUR are reported to be managed using sustainable criteria and using appropriate concepts.

On 18 November 2010 the "Islamic Finance Conference" will be held in Frankfurt am Main as part of the 13th EURO FINANCE WEEK (EFW) taking place from 15 to 19 November 2010 under the auspices of Dr. Wolfgang Schäuble, Minister of Finance of the Federal Republic of Germany.

The conference is organised in cooperation with the Union of Arab Banks. Institutional partner is the Institute for Islamic Banking and Finance.

The conference focuses challenges and opportunities of the Islamic Finance in Germany and in Europe and discusses investment trends, Sukuk’s opportunities as well as Islamic Wealth Management and last not least an Islamic Finance outlook.

Information about the event can be found under www.eurofinanceweek.com/islamicfinance

The organizer of the event, the Maleki Group, has offered a limited number of “Guest Ticket” exclusively for Islamic Finance group. Please note, admission upon the special guest ticket is very limited and the registrations will be processed on a first-come, first-served basis.

Steuerliche Würdigung im nationalen und internationalen Kontext

Der Markt Islamic Finance wächst rasant und umfasst bereits heute ein erhebliches Anlagevolumen. Demgegenüber besteht ein großer Kapitalbedarf in der europäischen, speziell auch in der deutschen Realwirtschaft ebenso wie ein Bedarf an Investoren.

Bei der Umsetzung von Islamic-Finance-Vertragsmodellen kann die Besteuerung im Einzelfall eine ausschlaggebende Rolle spielen. Daher erläutert die Autorin in diesem Buch für ausgewählte schariakonforme Finanzierungs- und Anlageformen zunächst die Scharia-Rahmenbedingungen der jeweiligen Vertragsmodelle aus deutscher rechtlicher, ertragsteuerlicher und verkehrsteuerlicher Sicht. Die steuerlichen Fragestellungen werden anhand von Beispielen im grenzüberschreitenden Corporate Bereich im Schnittpunkt von deutschem internationalem Steuerrecht und ausländischem Steuerrecht der weiteren beteiligen Staaten verdeutlicht.

Inhalt

* Einleitung
* Grundzüge von Islamic-Finance-Vertragsmodellen
- eigenkapitalbasierte („Musharaka“ und „Mudaraba“),
- fremdkapitalbasierte („Murabaha“ und „Tawarruq“) sowie

PricewaterhouseCoopers offers a full day event about Takaful in Germany language. Below more details:

PwC Talk
Sharia-konforme Lebensversicherungsprodukte
16. September 2010, Köln
20. September 2010, München

Während Sharia-konforme Bankprodukte auf Veranstaltungen bereits recht eingehend diskutiert wurden, ist das Thema Sharia-konformer Lebensversicherungsprodukte bisher kaum Gegenstand eines fachlichen Forums gewesen. Die Veranstaltung möchte daher den Versuch unternehmen, diesem weißen Fleck auf der deutschen Landkarte der Produktentwicklung eine erste Topographie zu geben. Der wachsende Anteil der muslimischen Bevölkerung in Deutschland und Europa ist hierzu hinreichender Anlass.

Zielgruppe

Die Veranstaltung richtet sich an Führungskräfte und Mitarbeiter von Versicherungsunternehmen aus den
Bereichen Kapitalanlage und Steuern/Recht sowie Führungskräfte und Mitarbeiter von Kreditinstituten,
Investmentbanken oder Asset-Management-Gesellschaften für die Bereiche Versicherungen, Steuern/Recht und Investment/ Kapitalanlage.

Financial Services Providers and Consumer Protection - Two Worlds?"
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear colleague and fellow stakeholder of financial services,

The European Coalition for Responsible Credit will be holding its international stakeholder conference “Financial Services Providers and Consumer Protection - Two Worlds?" on 2nd and 3rd July in Hamburg. The event, organised by coalition partner iff and supported by the German consumer associations and the working group on debt advice of the associations (AG SBV) will gather consumer organisations, debt and money advisers, bankers, financial service providers, policy makers, academics and politicians to discuss current issues in retail markets for financial services in Europe and elsewhere.

Ernst & Young prepared a statement in response to a query by the Central Council of Muslims in Germany regarding he tax assessment of selected Islamic finance contractual models. The attached report covers the main findings including an English summary.

FINANCE & ETHICS: DAS POTENTIAL VON ISLAMIC FINANCE, SRI, SPARKASSEN
HERAUSGEBER:
ALBERT LÖHR UND MILENA V. VALEVA
VERLAG: HAMPP, R; AUFLAGE: 1., AUFLAGE (1. APRIL 2010)
ISBN: 978-3866184558
Language: German

English SUMMARY
The global financial crisis of 2008/2009 found its initial expression in the banking crisis. The crisis made it unequivocally clear, that the exclusion of morals and ethics from the under-standing of finance should not continue. The question at hand is: Are ethics in the financial realm conceivable? Which normative understandings of finance are justifiable? Which im-plementation approaches of ethics and finance could be derived from theory and practice?

The IFSB said the National Bank of Tajikistan, Prudential Hong Kong, along with Malaysia-based OCBC Al Amin Bank and the Islamic reinsurance unit of Germany's Munich Re will join as "observer" members,

The 4th executive summmary now focusses on over 220 Shariah scholars with exposure to the Gulf Cooperation
Council (GCC), including their international board memberships with 1050+ board positions in almost 300
institutions and 24 countries.

It is the single most detailed analysis on Sharia Boards and their scholars published.

Funds at Work, the strategy consultants analysed the Social Responsible Investment industry with their network analysis. Previously the firm did analyse the Sharia Scholars and their board positions. The report regarding the sister industry of Islamic finance can be downloaded for free.

The Central Council of Muslims in Germany presented on the BAFIN Islamic Finance conference how mortgages for the Muslim community could look like, how large the market is and challenged the perception that there would be a need to change laws to avoid double real estate transfer tax; it shall rather work tax efficient with proper structuring and without changes. Hence, financial institutions are asked to provide equity and debt based mortgages for the Muslim market.

The German banking regulator, BAFIN, held today a conference about Islamic finance with strong international participation and about 200 guests.

BAFIN president, Mr Sanio, says that Germany makes it easy to obtain a licence to sell the products, which are also compatible with the country's financial rules. He expressively welcomed "the first interested party that wants to start offering these products".

KuveytTürk, the Turkish Islamic bank, has received according to Turkish media a license to operate as a financial service branch.

6.10.2010: Report is update and again free for download

3.9.2009:
Funds at Work, a strategy consultant for the fund industry, updated its analysis on Shariah scholars' engagement in financial service organisations in the GCC countries and now internationally covering companies with 956 (498) Sharia Board positions and 180 (121) scholars.

The study shows that the Top 5 scholars make up at least 30.15 % of the entire univese of almost 956 board positions. The Top 5 scholars internationally (ex GCC) out of 70 scholars active beyond the GCC - make 58.21 % of all positions (201 board positions).

The detailed summary of the study is free for download.

The German regulator BAFIN is organising an Islamic finance conference on 29 October 2009. The announcement is in German, but the conference is held in English. The conference shall show different aspects of Islamic finance, and to determine the salient features. Further it shall discuss the developments in the insurance sector and capital markets. The aim of the conference is to sharpen the conscience about Islamic finance und its increasing role, the foundations of sharia compliant business, and the challenges involved herewith from the regulatory perspective.

Contact details:
Ricarda.Maier@bafin.de
jochenrobert.elsen@bafin.de

The presentation is in German only.

Am 10. April wurde in der Volkshochschule Bielefeld in Zusammenarbeit mit dem Bündnis Islamischer Gemeinden ein Vortrag zur Wirtschaftskrise aus islamischer Sicht gehalten.

Die Präsentation wird hier als PDF Dokument zum Herunterladen angeboten. Die lebhafte Diskussion zu den einzelnen Punkten islamischer Finanzwirtschaft, Wirtschaftstheorie und Empfehlungen zur Wirtschaftskrise enthält sie leider nicht.

Allianz Indonesia grew by 8.5 % and is the fourth biggest life insurer in the country. In 2008 the MENA region has proven to be one of Allianz's growth powerhouses. Revenues from the region grew to 2.4 billion euros, an increase of 40 percent from last year. In Asia Pacific Property and casualty business (P&C) remains growth driver, unique opportunities to strengthen distribution.

Allianz offers conventional and Islamic coverage.

KuveytTürk aims to cater for German Muslims from payment services to the whole range of Islamic finance products in the years to come. The application process for a financial services branch with both regulators is ongoing but not yet finished contrary to what media sources were reporting yesterday.