IslamicFinance.de

Pakistan International Airlines Corp (PIA) raised $90 million (Dh330 million) through an Islamic syndicated fin-ancing facility.
Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank, Al Hilal Bank, Citibank, and United Bank Limited organized the facility being the mandated lead arrangers and joint bookrunners.
Clifford Chance and Haidermota & Co was the legal counsel to the arrangers, PIA being represented by Mandviwalla & Zafar.

According to Standard Chartered Saadiq, Islamic banking assets in the UAE are forseen to grow to 20 % of the total banking sector in 2012 from an estimated 18 % this year.
The bank anticipates Islamic assets to comprise 38 per cent of total consumer banking assets in the UAE in 2012, compared to about 35 per cent in 2010.
Globally, the Islamic banking industry is estimated to be worth $1 trillion.
Standard Chartered Saadiq plans to begin Islamic banking operations in Nigeria and Oman next year, as it seems to grow its Shariah-compliant business in the Middle East, Africa and southeast Asia.

Despite the fact that Zawya only covers Middle East-based funds, the sector is popular especially in Saudi Arabia, where 22 of the 24 funds listed are domiciled. The other two funds are from Kuwait and Bahrain.
There are two types of multi-manager funds: those that invest in a range of other funds controlled by different asset managers, named funds of funds, and those that appoint external managers with specific expertise to invest separate tranches of the provider’s portfolio, called manager of managers funds.
Analyzing funds of funds, it seems that there is a lot of interest in global Shari’ah compliant funds-of-funds (41.7%). Top performer is the $15.2m Al-Rajhi Multi Asset Conservative fund, managed by Mohammed Ishaq Ali of Al Rajhi Capital.

Nakheel made payments to the tune of ?Dh7.3 billion ($2 billion) to its trade creditors.
Nakheel will launch another Dh1 billion of sukuk before the end of this year as part of its Dh59 billion restructuring deal with trade creditors.
Under the company’s restructuring plan, the developer has presented trade creditors repayment of 40 per cent cash and the remaining 60 % in the form of sukuk.
Bank creditors will be offered an interest rate of four per cent over London Interbank Offered Rate (Libor) and repayment after five years.

United Arab Emirates (UAE)'s leading businesswomen are researching investment opportunities to work with Malaysians in two areas - Islamic finance and halal food.
According to Fatima Al Jaber, president of the Abu Dhabi Business Women Council and chief operating officer of Al Jaber Group, Islamic finance and halal food are the two mutual areas that Malaysia and UAE could work together. She added that UAE offered huge opportunities for Malaysians in many areas including leisure, hotel, sports, property, healthcare and education.

Middle Eastern publicly recorded companies are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of online transparency as part of their strategy to administer best practice investor relations.
This is the key conclusion of the 2011 KWD Middle East Webranking survey that annually reviews corporate websites across the region based on the requirements of the investment community.
The survey prooves that an increasing number of companies are revolving to online channels to communicate with shareholders, disclosing more information on financials, corporate governance, CSR initiatives and company news on their websites.
The winners of the KWD Webranking Survey are as followed: Al Khalij Commercial Bank from Qatar presented itself as overall winner in the Middle East, followed by Aamal Company, also from Qatar, in second place. UAE real estate group Emaar remained on its position as third best corporate website.

According to Kuwait Finance House-Bahrain CEO and MD, Abdul Hakim Al-Khayyat, Islamic banking has many advantages and capabilities that are giving it permission to play an important role in solving many economic problems in the GCC.
Al-Khayyat underlined the fact that Islamic banking is not operating at full swing yet, either as a result of lack of legislations or opportunities. Furthermore, he notified that governments need to launch more Sukuk, so they can provide short-term liquidity instruments.
However, since legislations that organise the issuance of Sukuk in some countries don't exist, this significant instrument has been presented as extinct, which consumes the efforts of Islamic banks to help markets overcome their crises.

A Master’s of Management Finance degree program will be opened this coming spring at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business from Dubai.
The program will mainly focus on conventional finance.

It seems that Islamic banking has numerous advantages and capabilities that gives it permission to play an important role in solving many economic problems in the GCC. The statement cam from Kuwait Finance House-Bahrain Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Abdul Hakim Al Khayyat.
He added that Islamic banking services have made the way for the future easier, and have become one of the most important alternatives that many economies worldwide search.
He explained that Islamic banks can have an efficient role in solving the housing problem through its role in construction projects and real estate development, not to mention several instruments that finance that sector, such as murabaha, ijarah, and others.

Kuwait’s Beyoo Investment and Finance Co is switching its attention from financing to asset and wealth management as the investment arm of Al Imtiaz Investment Company.
Arabic language daily Al Anba announced that Beyoo's shareholders approved changing its name into Dima Capital Investment to reflect this change in activity.

Tamweel hired banks for a possible bond sale as it looking for financing to repay liabilities and increase lending. The shares presented a jumprecord in a month.
Citigroup, Standard Chartered and Dubai Islamic Bank will make appointments for investor meetings in Asia, Europe and the United Arab Emirates.
Tamweel plans to raise at least $300 million to $500 million from Islamic bond sale in the fourth quarter.

The Islamic Corporation for the Development of the Private Sector has appointed Malaysia’s INCEIF to deliver its Chartered Islamic Finance Professional course for the ICD’s two-year Islamic finance talent development program.
The program will begin in January 2012 in Jeddah. ICD received more than 300 applications for the new program, which has the purpose to take in up to 24 participants in the future. Al-Aboodi, ICD's CEO, hopes that graduates will eventually work in Islamic finance jurisdictions where talent is lacking.

According to Ernst & Young's inaugural World Islamic Banking Competitiveness Report 2011, Islamic banking's market share of all banking assets in Gulf extanded over the 25 per cent threshold in 2011.
The report forseen that Mena Islamic banking assets with commercial banks will more than double to $990 billion by 2015 as Islamic banks compete for mainstream customers who are open to Islamic or conventional banking.

Boubyan Takaful Insurance Company signed a consulting services agreement with Protiviti for Risk Management aimed at supporting the Company's development.
Protiviti will determine the areas of focus and expand them with the management of Boubyan Takaful Insurance to include them within the services of the company, which will make sure that it is working according to the highest standards. The company will also designate a clear risk management, assessment and control strategy and launch an awareness campaign about risk for all its staff members.

It is possible that Legal & General Gulf Takaful will set up business operations in Malaysia at some point to meet the growing demand for takaful products. The statement came from managing director, Manfred Maske.
Land & General Gulf Takaful is a joint venture insurance company formed in 2009 between Legal & General Group and Ahli United Bank.

It seems that Kuwait's role in the fast-growing global market for sukuks could become larger, if lawmakers expand and administer a more robust legal framework to regulate the issuance of sharia-compliant debt.
However, during this time, Kuwait-based Gulf Investment Corporation (GIC) and Kuveyt Turk participation bank have raised funds in the last months by selling sukuks.

The prime theme of this event will be the impact of the recent rapid changes on the
Islamic finance sector in all pertinent aspects. The Conference will consider the
spectacular political and socio-economic developments that we have been witnessing and
their probable effects on the performance and future position of Islamic financial
institutions (IFI’s), the regulatory set-ups, and popularity of Islamic products being
offered to the public, governments and business firms.

The Conference is being organised by Emerald Group Publishing, the world’s leading
scholarly publisher of journals and books on business and management. Over 220
academic journals are currently published by Emerald, covering some 24 managerial
disciplines, in addition to a strong and growing presence in other related fields such as
LIS, social sciences, and engineering.

This Conference follows on the success of the Global Islamic Marketing Conference held
in Dubai over the period 20-22 March 2011, organised by Emerald in association with the
United Arab Emirates University.

Conference Objective

The chief objective of the forthcoming Conference is to assess the future of this sector,

The International Islamic Liquidity Management Corporation (IILM) is assumed to launch its first sukuk in the next six months, as it will contribute to better liquidity management. The statement was given by Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) Governor Tan Sri Zeti akhtar Aziz.
IILM has the purpose to enhance the availability of liquid Shariah-based Islamic financial market instruments. This is a crucial step in promoting more efficient cross-border liquidity management for Islamic financial institutions to sustain increased cross-border flows.

The governors of central banks and monetary authorities of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) member countries are convening brought together for a meeting hosted by Bank Negara Malaysia, the central bank, at its plush new conference centre in Sasana Kijang in Kuala Lumpur.
The official theme of the meeting is “Central Banking and Financial Sector Development”. But is is inevitable that discussions will also concentrate on how the global financial crisis, the euro zone sovereign debt crisis and the fallout of the so-called “Arab Spring” are impacting on OIC member countries, and on some alternative solutions to deal with some of the impact of these developments.

The Islamic Development Bank’s community development workshop has the purpose to empower Muslim NGOs in different parts of the world by offering them necessary training to boost their leadership skills.
Prominent leaders of Muslim organizations and institutions in 14 countries including Australia, Bangladesh, Brazil, c and the Philippines who had come to the Kingdom to perform Haj this year, including professor Siddique Hassan, vice president of Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, will be included in the program.