IslamicFinance.de

Even though Islamic finance has been thriving in Malaysia, a country with one of the most established and regulated Islamic finance frameworks, it is hardly present on the global Islamic finance market. Moreover, the majority of local banks tako part in neither the global syndication market nor the sukuk market. Therefore, confidence has to be built up in order for Malaysian banks to stop peceiving themselves as inferior to other syariah-compliant frameworks.

The Finance Ministry is planning to establish a special-purpose Buddhist bank which wil be similar to the Islamic Bank of Thailand. The decision is based on an estimated savings amount of temples accross the country in weight of over 200 billion baht. In the first step, a particular outlet of the Government Savings Bank will be used as an alternative for temples to make deposits. The management of the deposits will be in accordance with the rules of Buddhism.

Malaysian Bank Muamalat announced the launch of the first Islamic bank in China. The project is planned to be realized in a two-years' time in team with Bank of Shi Zui Shan of China. The new bank will be situated in the autonomous region of Ningxia Hui. Its role will be to contribute to the development and promotion of Islamic banking in the region.

A government- guaranteed Islamic medium-term notes programme (IMTN) with a tenure of up to 20 years in weight of RM3 billion will be issued by the Small and Medium Enterprises Bank Bhd (SME Bank). According to the bank's managing director, the first issuing will be in accordance with the investment structure knon as the wakalah structure. AmInvestment Bank Bhd, Kuwait Finance House (M) Bhd and Maybank Investment Bank Bhd are appointed as the joint lead arrangers and joint lead managers for the sukuk.

In a sukuk auction which took place on Tuesday, Indonesia as able to raise 460 billion rupiah ($48.65 million). Accourding to the debt office, the price was below the goal of 500 billion rupiah. The sukuk was a 25-year project-based bond at a weighted average yield of 6.69 percent. There were no winning bids for the rest of the sukuks in the auction.

Because of sweeping government reforms in their pension system, Malasians are most likely to allocate part of their retirement contributions to Islamic investments. Since the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) has limits in investing syariah-compliant areas, the new, voluntary Private Retirement Scheme (PRS) is meant to supplement it. Thus, contributors will be able to allocate money to a wide range of products offered by private-sector fund management firms including syariah-compliant investment. The result is a potential rise in the amount of money going into Islamic instruments.

Standard Chartered Saadiq is offering Takaful products to Prudential BSN: three new Takaful investment-linked plans at eight of its branches. In addition, these Takaful products will soon be available at the 32 conventional Standard Chartered branches in the country. Customers can count flexibility to secure protection and investment plans which correspond to their lifestyle and financial needs.

With the scheduled launch of the company’s Shariah compliant Independent Finance Unit branded “CDB Meezan”, Citizens Development Business Finance PLC (CDB) endeavours an expansion in the domestic market of Islamic Finance. As part of CDB, “CDB Meezan” will act under its supervision and will offer a range of deposit and financing products and services to its entire clientele. “CDB Meezan” was made possible thanks to the expert guidance and supervision of SEC registered Investment Manager, Adl Capital Limited.

According to Norton Rose, its Middle East team is a ‘regional’ one in which no lawyers have formal bases. This was the answer given to the resignation of two of its lawyers in Bahrain.
The only two lawyers that stayed are construction partner Joanne Emerson-Taqi and project finance senior associate Angela Croker.
By comparison, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer lists three Bahrain-based lawyers (a partner, an associate and a principal consultant) on its website, while Trowers & Hamlins’ lists 15 lawyers and Baker & McKenzie’s lists 12.

Jebel Ali Free Zone FZE wants to raise a mix $1.85 billion from a bank facility and the sale of Islamic bonds to help refinance its 7.5 billion-dirham ($2 billion) debt maturing in November.
It appears that the company authorized Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank PJSC, Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank PJSC, Citigroup Inc., Dubai Islamic Bank PJSC, Emirates NBD PJSC, National Bank of Abu Dhabi PJSC and Standard Chartered Plc to prepare investor meetings in Asia, Europe and the Middle East from June 5 ahead of a possible sukuk sale.

The third annual Invesco Middle East Asset Management Study shows that strong corporate returns are constraining the flow of year-on-year capital within family offices in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) from ­personal assets to corporate (family business) assets.
Two-fifths (40%) of family offices interviewed noted a strong shift from personal to corporate assets. Moreover, high net-worth assets in the Middle East account for nearly 4% of the global high-net-worth asset pool.

Syed Alwi bin Mohamed Sultan, the Kuala Lumpur-based head of Islamic banking for Asia Pacific at BNP Paribas Malaysia Bhd., talked about the trends in Islamic finance at the World Islamic Banking Conference in Singapore.
He noted that there is more diversification of the investor base. Potential issuance this year are from countries like South Africa, Kenya, and Senegal.

It seems that Qatar's Masraf Al Rayan is in talks to become the biggest shareholder in Islamic Bank of Britain (IBB).
The bank stated that Masraf Al Rayan will access 70% of the bank and the government of the state of Qatar will have the remaining 30%.
The bank noted that it would also get hold on "two major share portions of two Qatari companies operating in the industry of maintenance of oil and gas fields", subject to approval from authorities.

An agreement was signed by Al Baraka Banking Group with the World Bank in order to launch joint programmes under a set of new Shari'ah-compliant finance initiatives.
The programmes have the purpose to foster sustainable development of Islamic economics and finance, through the design and delivery of activities like identifying and disseminating sound practices in the Islamic financial services industry.

It seems that Dubai Islamic Bank has issued a $500 million (Dh1.8 billion), five-year sukuk sale after gaining good request.
Helping arrange the Regulation S transaction, after DIB met fixed-income investors in Asia, Middle East and Europe over the past few days, are: Deutsche Bank, DIB, Emirates NBD, HSBC and National Bank of Abu Dhabi.
Fitch Ratings assigned to DIB's $2.5 billion trust certificate issuance program a ‘A 'expected rating.

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 former chief executive and founder of Bahrain's Bank Alkhair has lost a civil court allegation in the kingdom which chased to strike down his dismissal by the bank, the latest round of a legal battle between the two parties.
The judgement is the latest development in a series of legal cases following Al-Refai's departure from the bank.

According to A.T. Kearney, the modifying market dynamics are showing a new trend, with two key indicators giving cause for reflection: slowing growth rates and eroding profitability.
Descending growth rates are coming up in key geographies including KSA, Bahrain and the UAE, where growth rates have dropped to between 3% and 8% from double-digit figures.

Family businesses are estimated in the Middle East at around 90% of all companies in the region controlled by families. Furthermore, its importance was underlined with the launch of the Family Business Network GCC, the first of its kind in the area.
The network will be based in Dubai, including members of the Gulf Cooperation Council, which includes Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE

Despite the fact that they have been around for many years, they are only now being noticed because of a variety of factors.
The difference between then and now is that there are more Muslims in the financial sector and non-Muslim colleagues know more about Islam because of a combination of internet, 24-7 news, 9/11, documentaries, Dubai's accomplishments, Islamic finance and personalities like His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai.
After New York Times recently interviewed several American Muslims, two ‘conflicts' were elaborated: Muslims working in conventional finance may encounter ‘interest' against their faith, and challenges of abiding by Islamic ‘traditions' in a secular workplace.