Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB) has completed the acquisition of Noor Bank through a share swap deal. As part of the agreement, DIB has issued 651 million new shares to take its issued share capital to 7.2 billion shares. The new DIB shares have been listed and admitted to trading on the Dubai Financial Market. The GCC financial services industry is witnessing a wave of consolidation as banks seek ways to improve competitiveness. Earlier this week, the National Bank of Bahrain acquired a 78.8% stake in Bahrain Islamic Bank. Similarly, Alizz Islamic Bank’s Board of Directors approved a share swap ratio for the proposed merger with Oman Arab Bank.
The government of Sharjah is tapping the debt markets to help fund large-scale infrastructure and economic development programmes. On March 8 the emirate closed the book on a dollar-denominated sukuk, valued at $1bn. The 10-year bond was listed on the NASDAQ Dubai with an initial price of 150 basis points over the 10-year mid-swap rate, which then tightened to 135 basis points. Demand was high and the bond was oversubscribed, at around $2.4bn. Book runners were local, regional and global lenders, including the Sharjah Islamic Bank (SIB), Dubai Islamic Bank, HSBC and Standard Chartered. In early February the emirate also became the first Gulf sovereign issuer to tap the Chinese interbank bond market, issuing a RMB2bn ($318.4m) Panda bond. The increased investment is expected to boost GDP growth, with ratings agency S&P anticipating growth of 2.5% per year by 2020.
Meraas Holding, a real estate developer in Dubai owned by the UEA government, issued a $400 million sukuk last week. It was sold privately to a select group of investors, according to sources. The Islamic bond has a five-year maturity and is at par with a 5.112 % yield on May the 26th and traded at one to 1.5 points above par shortly after that. Emirates NBD, Noor Bank and Standard Chartered jointly coordinated the transaction and served as bookrunners along with Dubai Islamic Bank, Sharjah Islamic Bank and Warba Bank.
Meraas is the parent company of the leisure and entertainment company DXB Entertainment, which owns 4 theme parks and a water park in UAE capital. It has been said, that a new entity has been set up which will manage billions of dollars of development projects for Meraas Holding and Dubai Holding. Dubai Holding is the investment vehicle of Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum. Raed Kajoor Al Nuaimi, formerly chief executive of DXB Entertainment, has been appointed to lead the new management company.
Global law firm Baker McKenzie has successfully acted for Dubai Islamic Bank in its defence of a $2 billion claim brought against it in the English Commercial Court. The claim was brought by Plantation Holdings, a holding company owned by an Argentinian-resident property developer. The allegation was breach of contract related to plot of land on the outskirts of Dubai, which Plantation had planned to develop into a high-end luxury lifestyle and equestrian complex. The Bank took security over the project as part of the restructuring of a $500 million debt owed to it as a result of a complex receivables financing fraud. The case was heard in an eight week trial, with evidence from witnesses from seven jurisdictions. The court ruled that Plantation's principal director had made up evidence and that another of Plantation's witnesses had manufactured documents, Plantation has been ordered to pay 70% of the Bank's costs on the indemnity basis. The nature of the case also resulted in examining the volatility of the Dubai property market and the functionality of its property registration system, as well as the Dubai authorities' approach to financial misconduct.
Turkish treasury mandated the Dubai Islamic Bank, HSBC, and Standard Chartered to explore opportunities for a possible sukuk issue. A series of investor meetings will be organised in the UAE on March 28, 2017. Meanwhile, the country’s monetary authority raised its highest interest rate while leaving all of the other rates unchanged. The lira rallied as the move was seen paving for they way for tighter policy and serving as insurance against bouts of currency weakness.
Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank (ADIB) is leading a $272m Islamic financing facility for Meydan Group to fund its projects in Dubai. The deal was structured to meet Meydan’s financing objectives, on the back of its ongoing District One Project, a master-planned luxury residential neighborhood in Dubai’s Mohammed Bin Rashid City.
Dubai Islamic Bank and Al Hilal Bank were both mandated lead arrangers for the financing, which matures in December 2018. Tirad Al Mahmoud, CEO of ADIB, said: “[The deal] also evidences the results we are achieving through stepping up our corporate financing activity, with a particular focus on high-growth companies and the real estate sector.” The deal will help utilise financing for the group’s current and future projects including those along the Dubai Water Canal. The funding will also help finance continued investment across all Meydan areas.
Neelum Jhelum Hydropower Company (Pvt) Limited has entered into a financing agreement amounting to Rs 100 bn with a consortium of 16 banks led by National Bank of Pakistan for raising funds through one of the largest Shariah-compliant facility. The financing is based on Diminishing Musharika structured by NBP Aitemaad. The Sukuk is structured with a tenor of 10 years and is backed by the sovereign guarantee from Government of Pakistan.
NJHPC mandated National Bank of Pakistan to act as Mandated Lead Arranger for arrangement of up to Rs 100 billion through issuance of rated, secured and privately placed Sukuks to partially finance the construction of strategically important 969 MW hydel power project located in District Muzaffarabad, Azad Jammu & Kashmir. For this financing, a signing ceremony was held on Wednesday here and attended by President & CEO NBP Syed Iqbal Ashraf, Chairman Wapda Zafar Mahmood, member finance Wapda Anwaar ul Haq, CEO NJHPCL Lieutenant General Muhammad Zubair and other presidents and senior officials of all the 16 participating financial institutions.
Dubai Islamic Bank is opening subscriptions on Tuesday for a 3.16 bn dirham ($860.3 mn) rights issue. The bank is offering 988.4 mn new shares to shareholders in total, with subscription open on the basis of one new share for every four currently held. Shares are priced at 3.2 dirhams each, a substantial discount to Monday's closing share price of 4.95 dirhams. DIB is the latest bank in the Gulf to replenish reserves after a period of strong lending growth. At the end of March DIB's total capital adequacy ratio stood at 15.6%, above the UAE's regulatory minimum of 12%.
Abu Dhabi-listed Sharjah Islamic Bank said on Monday it had obtained a three-year, $265 million syndicated murabaha financing facility from a group of banks.
ABC Islamic Bank, Dubai Islamic Bank, Emirates NBD Capital and Noor Bank were lead arrangers and bookrunners, Sharjah Islamic said without giving pricing details.
Dubai Islamic Bank, the largest Islamic bank in the UAE, announced today that it had launched the first UAE Sharia Departments Forum 2016.The event was organized by the Bank, as Founder & Sponsor with the valued participation of other local Islamic banks, to create a platform where the Sharia departments of financial institutions across the country can meet to exchange experiences and share solutions to the challenges they face, with the strategic objective of developing the Islamic financial services sector in the UAE. The opening event took place on April 30, 2016, at The Palace Hotel in Dubai.
As the first event of its kind in the country, the Forum was led by Sharia department at DIB and featured the Sharia departments of other local Islamic banks including Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank ,Emirates Islamic and Al Hilal Bank . 'Sharia Audit' was chosen as the theme of the event this year with a very comprehensive series of panels, each of which was led by one of the participants, discussing a different element of the topic.
Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB) is inviting its shareholders to subscribe for new shares, by way of a 1-for-4 rights issue. The Board of Directors resolved on 27 April to increase the issued capital of the Bank by AED 988,437,777 raising the capital of the bank to AED 4,942,188,884. The New Shares will be issued at a price of AED 3.20 per New Share, reflecting the nominal value of AED 1.00 per New Share and a share premium of AED 2.20. The ownership limitation on DIB’s shares remains in place: 51 per cent of the issued share capital of the bank must be owned by nationals of the United Arab Emirates.
Dubai-based property developer Limitless is set to complete a drawn-out debt restructuring after the final dissenting creditor sold its share of the company's 4.45 billion dirhams ($1.2 billion) debt. New York-based Stonehill Capital Management sold its debt in the state-controlled company, worth around $15 million at face value, to Dubai Islamic Bank, an existing creditor and one of the members of the creditor committee. They declined to say at what price the debt was bought.
Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB) plans to be operating in Kenya before the end of 2016, despite the Kenyan authorities' moratorium on issuing new banking licences. Kenyan banks have come under closer scrutiny from the regulator because of increasing bad debts, prompting officials and analysts to conclude the sector is ripe for consolidation. Three medium-sized and small banks have been taken over by the regulator since August last year. DIB had been in talks with the regulator before the moratorium was placed on the licensing of new commercial banks last November, meaning it would not affect a decision on its licence.
Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB) has listed its latest sukuk worth $500 million on Nasdaq Dubai, bringing the bank’s total sukuk listings on the region’s international exchange to $3.25 billion. Following a total of seven sukuk listings this year by regional and international issuers, the total value of sukuk currently listed in Dubai has reached $42.61 billion, the largest amount of any listing centre in the world, underlining the rapid expansion of Dubai as a global capital of the Islamic Economy. Given the challenging market conditions, it was critical to have a strong credit come in and successfully close a deal, said Dr Adnan Chilwan, group CEO, DIB.
Dubai Islamic Bank returned to the international debt capital markets with a very successful $500 million 5Y Sukuk issue yesterday. This deal is the first GCC bank issuance since November 2015 and essentially marks the reopening of the market after a hiatus of 4+ months. The transaction is being hailed as a tremendous accomplishment in the current environment where the GCC has gone through a well-documented change in onshore liquidity conditions and witnessed multiple rating downgrades, which have been mainly the result of the drop in oil prices. The offering was oversubscribed (2.4x) attracting more than $1.2 billion in demand from 87 investors.
Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB) is expected to price a dollar-denominated sukuk of benchmark size as soon as Tuesday after releasing initial price thoughts for the offering, a document from lead arrangers showed. Pricing for the five-year sukuk has been earmarked to be in the area of 245 basis points over midswaps, according to the document. DIB chose seven banks to arrange meetings with fixed income investors in London on Monday, ahead of the possible sukuk issue, it was announced last week.
Dubai Islamic Bank is embarking on a roadshow for a senior dollar sukuk, and looks likely to be the first bank from the Gulf Cooperation Council to enter the public bond markets this year. Bank ABC, DIB, Emirates Islamic Bank, HSBC, National Bank of Abu Dhabi, Sharjah Islamic Bank and Standard Chartered Bank have arranged fixed income investor meetings to take place in London on March 21. DIB, rated Baa1/—/A, will print the Reg S note under its $2.5bn sukuk programme.
Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB) has launched four new Wakala Deposit product variants. The DIB Wakala Deposit product variants offer various schemes in terms of tenures and profit rates. DIB’s Long Term Wakala Deposits offer a 15.25% profit rate on a 5 year, or 8% profit rate on a 3 year tenure. Customers can also subscribe to DIB Maximizer Deposits, an 18-month facility which is developed on step-up profit rates of up to 6%. Furthermore, the Recurring Wakala Deposit is a deposit product whereby a fixed amount is deposited on a monthly basis. A minimum goal of AED 12,000 (AED 1,000 per month) is agreed upon – as well as the recurring instalment payments.
The emirate of Sharjah is targeting a five-year sukuk offering and could launch a transaction as early as this week, a document from lead arrangers showed on Tuesday. The sovereign finished roadshows on Monday in London, following investor meetings in the Middle East and Asia last week, and was now in the process of receiving feedback from the market, the document added. The emirate mandated Bank Of Sharjah, Barclays, Commerzbank, Dubai Islamic Bank, HSBC and Sharjah Islamic Bank to arrange the meetings and the possible transaction. Sharjah was reported to be planning to raise funds through a dollar-denominated sukuk of benchmark size, in what could be the first sovereign Islamic bond issuance from the region this year.
Looking to 2016 and beyond, innovation will continue to be critical for the ongoing development of the Islamic finance industry. For instance, efficiency can still be improved as Sharia-compliant institutions still lag behind their conventional counterparts, and are increasingly looking to embrace technological innovation in order to minimise operational costs as well as project a modern face of banking that would appeal to a younger generation of customers, which will be critical for ongoing growth. Another area of development is the Islamic asset management sector, as the range of services available remains quite limited and there is a general lack of quality products in this space.