IslamicFinance.de

Stanley Carvalho reported on 31 March on Reuters that Abu Dhabi's government-owned Al Hilal Bank will set up an Islamic bank in Kazakhstan. Al Hilal will headquarter the new bank in the central Asian state's capital Almaty, opening in the second half of 2009 with an initial capital of AED 100 mn(USD 27 mn).

Chairman of Hilal Bank is Ahmed Ateeq al-Mazrouei.

Stanley Carvalho reported on 21 January in Arabianbusiness that two financial institutions in the Gulf may be licensed to introduce Islamic banking in france later this year according to a member of the French banking delegation, one of them being Qatar Islamic Bank, the second possibly located in Bahrain.