IslamicFinance.de

Nigeria’s Jaiz Bank has been assigned positive rating by the Islamic International Rating Agency (IIRA). This is the first rating for the bank as the first Sharia compliant bank in the country. The Bank gets an investment grade rating of BBB (Triple B) for the medium to long-term and A2 in the short-term (A Two) on the national scale. The IIRA also assigned it a foreign currency rating of B-/B (Single B Minus/B) and local currency rating of B/B (Single B/B) on the international scale with a ‘Stable’ outlook. The agency affirmed that when compared, Jaiz Bank fares well in terms of risk exposure with its gross non-performance falling below 10%.

Speaker of the Niger State House of Assembly, Alhaji Ahmed Marafa Guni, has explained why the house rejected to access N21.5 billon Sukuk bond for infrastructure development. He said the house discovered a lot of discrepancies in the bond deal and, therefore, decided to send it back to the Executive. He added there were hidden costs in the loan which would tie down the state for several years. The speaker said the sukuk request could still be re-presented if those discrepancies are addressed. The government said it had asked the assembly to stay action on the request because of insinuations that the money was meant for the 2019 general election campaign.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Debt Management Office (DMO) have inaugurated a committee for the nation’s first sovereign Sukuk. Mr Mounir Gwarzo, SEC Director-General, who confirmed the committee’s inauguration, said it comprised staff of the commission and DMO, and would set up modalities for the first sovereign bond. He said that Sukuk had not been approved by the commission at the moment. Gwarzo said that recently, the commission was working with the DMO to ensure issuance of the bond in the second quarter of 2016. He said that the commission would support DMO in capacity building to ensure successful issuance of the bond.

Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has granted a na­tional licence to Jaiz Bank and a waiver on the reduc­tion of its liquidity ratio from 30 per cent to 10 per cent. The licence will enable Jaiz Bank operate in any part of the country. The Managing Director and Chief Executive of Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC), Al­haji Umaru Ibrahim, informed that the corpo­ration had developed a non-interest banking deposit insurance fund framework in May 2015, in order to provide depos­it protection for depositors involved in non-interest banking, in addition to training its staff in Malaysia in this area of banking. The NDIC was in the process of ap­pointing a committee of experts to advice it on all is­sues relating to Deposits Insurance Scheme (DIS) for non-interest banking, he added.

Leeds United owners GFH Capital are reportedly planning to sell the football club, just seven weeks after completing their takeover. Current owner of Hull FC rugby league club Adam Pearson is believed to be leading a bid by a consortium of Yorkshire businessmen. The deal is understood to be for 51 per cent with a full takeover later this year. A GFH Capital statement last night said that they had received several offers to invest in the club alongside them, but none had been accepted.