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Western Union and Saudi lender Bank Albilad have signed an agreement to launch Western Union's Account-Based Money Transfer (ABMT) service in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Syndicated lending by Saudi Arabian banks has increased by almost twice in 2012, according to Bloomberg. On the contrary, syndicated lending has slowed overall in the Middle East and North Africa as it fell by 5 percent this year registering its first decline since 2009. The Shariah-compliant bond market is mostly driven by privately held companies in Saudi Arabia, the largest Arab economy, as they keen to access the public debt markets and thus earn higher yields.

Saudi Arabia is studying draft regulations which are probable to contribute to the establishment of real a real estate refinancing company similar to U.S. firm Fannie Mae. The government has been making efforts to develop a housing mortgage sector in the kingdom for a long time. Saudi Arabia's conservative character however stick to restrictions of Islamic sharia law which have made it difficult to secure lending against property. Meanwhile, the country suffers from a shortage of housing, especially among lower and middle-income people. As land prices rise quickly, several months ago the government passed laws to regulate mortgage and lease lending.

The long awaited regulations on real estate financing, leasing and supervision of financial companies are now eventually being issued by the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA). Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia is getting ready to open up its mortgage market. The public now has to review the draft regulations. Comments and observations are to be submitted within 30 days of its publication. The regulations can be found on SAMA's website. The executive vice president of Capitas Group International - Nasser Nubani - explains that the draft mortgage regulations are a clear indication of SAMA's careful approach and striving to defend against problems due to lax regulation standards.

Total assets under management reached USD 59.5 billion at the end of the third quarter of this year. A huge part of the assets - more than a half - are invested in money market and Saudi trade finance funds. Further 25% is invested in equities. The remaining assets are allocated among fixed income securities, IPOs, protected or guaranteed funds, and many other types. The distribution of the assets in terms of number of funds however shows different figures. 40% in equities, 19% in fixed income and sukuk, and 14% in money market and Saudi trade finance are the percentages according to this aspect of distribution.

The main focus of Islamic Finance News Forum was the continuous rise of the Islamic capital markets in the Gulf region as well as worldwide. According to managing director and chief executive officer of Alinma Bank - Abdulmohsen A. Al-Fares - the Sukuk market is part of Islamic Capital Market (ICM) and is growing at a quick pace. He further pointed out that even though the total ICM make up less than 2% of the worldwide bond issues, it still is a promosing area since Sukuk issues in 2011 amounted to about 84.4 billion worldwide with the tendency to grow further.

Safa Investment Services - a global Islamic asset manager in in the Gulf region - was launched by Investor for Securities Company. The grand ceremony was held in Four Seasons Hotel, Al Riyadh, on the 8th of October 2012. According to the manager of Safa Investment Services, Mr. John Sandwick, professionally managed assets around the world are worth nearly $80 trillion. Muslims are in possession of about $3 trillion of them. Surprisingly, a huge extent of the money was not invested compliant with Shariah principles. It is a goal of Safa to provide Sharia-compliant investing opportunities and to produces profits larger than those of conventional investing.

The expectations of Sedco Capital are that its assets under management will double during the next five years due to the company's expansion into new. The expansion plans are driven by the increasing demand from Shariah-compliant investors. The investment firm established an entity in Luxembourg in July 2012 aiming to expand its reach in the Shariah-compliant private equity, real estate and commodities space. Unlike most sharia-compliant firms, which operate on a regional basis, Sedco wants to go global.

Just as HSBC Holdings announced it would shrink its Islamic banking operations in a number of countries, the National Bank of Abu Dhabi made plans to increase the contribution of its Shariah-compliant operations three times over the next eight years. Thus, it becomes clear that HSBC's move is nothing but a sign of its own priorities. While it is set to continue its operations mainly in Malaysia and Saudi Arabia with a limited presence in Indonesia, local banks have the opportunity to step in for it.

It was recently stated in the Financial Times that Saudi Arabia intends to lobby the UK government in November in order to set up a confidential court in London. The court is to settle multimillion pound commercial disputes coming from the Middle Eastern country. The people of Saudi Arabia hope that an arbitration centre based in London will contribute to countering investor concerns about the Saudi Arabian legal system. This way, foreign investment could be stimulated. According to Amgad Husein and John Balouziyeh from SNR Denton, the success of such an arbitration centre depends on its implementation.

Almarai Co, dairy and food producer in Saudi Arabia, has planned the issuance of the second tranche of its riyal-denominated sukuk programme in the coming months. The sukuk is directed towards private investors who are residents of the Kingdom. The first tranche, which was issued in March, was able to raise 1 billion riyals ($266.6 million). Thus, the deal was 4.7 times oversubscribed. The sukuk programme aims to help finance the company's $4.2 billion investment programme to expand its business between 2013 to 2017.

Almarai Co, a producer of dairy and food products, announced its intentions of issuing the second tranche of a riyal-denominated sukuk programme. The issuance is to be made in the coming months and is directed towards private investors. The first tranche of the programme brought the company 1 billion riyals ($266.6 million). The investors in the second tranche have to be residents of the Kingdom. The sukuk is to contribute to financing Almarai's $4.2 billion investment programme, the goal of which is the expansion of the company's business between 2013 to 2017.

Although since the catastrophic Jeddah floods of 2009 it has been talked a lot about corruption and incompetence in government departments and city municipalities, the issue of state owned enterprises or SOEs has hardly received any attention. That given the fact that these SOEs make up about 50% of the country's non-oil economy and account for over 25% of the employees in the private sector. The management of the Kingdom's SOEs are rarely held responsible for the waste of public funds on the mismanagement of the country’s national assets. As the main reason for this, the way of choosing the boards of directors of these SOEs or state owned enterprises is pointed out.

Read more on: http://www.saudigazette.com.sa/index.cfm?method=home.regcon&contentid=20...

On Saturday, the Islamic Corporation for the Insurance of Investment and Export Credit (ICIEC) and the National Commercial Bank (NCB) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI). The purpose of the Memorandum is to encourage the export in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Saudi Arabia. According to the agreement, the signatories are to cooperate on finding solutions for the funding problems of SMEs. The agreement was signed under the auspices of JCCI's Chairman, Sheikh Saleh Abdullah Kamel.

According to an announcement by the Saudi Savola Group, its board is set to acquire the approval of shareholders on the matter of selling sukuk.

Read more on: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/22/savola-brief-idUSWEA507120121022

Without causing much noise, liquidity-rich Arab banks have been taking part in commodity trade finance - an area which, until recently, was dominated by a small number of French banks. While the market share of eurozone banks has decreased from 80% two years ago to 50% today, banks from the Gulf region become more and more present. The lending limitations of the eurozone banks is caused by constrained US dollar liquidity.

Read more on: http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/d775f476-144a-11e2-8cf2-00144feabdc0.html...

At least five years later than initially supposed, Saudi Arabian and Malaysian Islamic finance experts start again their efforts to create common regulations for scholars. Together with its Middle Eastern counterpart, the Malaysian International Shariah Research Academy for Islamic Finance has started its work on guidelines which will be targeted at the number of boards on which scholars can sit to reduce conflicts of interest. Also, an institution aiming to provide global accreditation will be established. Thus, the industry's need to boost confidence and improve transparency can be met.

Al Jazira Bank has registered net income of SAR 130 million during the third quarter of the year. This is an increase of 97% in comparison with the net income SAR 66 million for the same period last year. Compared to the second quarter of 2012, there is an increase of 1% from SAR 129 million. The difference between the total operating income during the third quarter this year and the same period in 2011 is 33% in favour of Q3 2012.

Read more on: http://www.cpifinancial.net/news/post/16209/al-jazira-bank-q3-profit-up-...

This month Islamic Development Bank (IDB) issued a US$500m five-year sukuk. This is a rare example of a privately-placed transaction from this institution. Market data show that the deal was priced at 30 basis points (bps) over the three-month London interbank offered rate. The issuance is prat of bank's US$6.5bn sukuk programme.

Read more on: http://www.arabianbusiness.com/islamic-development-bank-places-500m-suku...

According to an announcement by Bloomberg, Banque Saudi Fransi (BSFR) has been approved by the Saudi central bank to issue Islamic bonds worth SR2.5bn ($667m). The expected effects of the sukuk include enhancing the bank's capital base and expansion of ots lending activities.

Read more on: http://www.ameinfo.com/sama-approves-banque-saudi-fransis-667m-315206