IslamicFinance.de

Algeria’s Prime Minister, Ahmed Ouyahia, announced that Islamic banking is to be approved in two public government banks before the end of this year and will be approved in four other banks in 2018. According to Ouyahia, this funding was inevitable because of the country's difficult economic and financial situation, and it will be limited in time because it will continue till no later than 2022. Algeria has about 29 banking institutions, seven of them are government-owned public banks, and more than 20 foreign banks from the Gulf countries, others are French and one is British. The Algerian government has applied Islamic banking in a limited way through the Zakat Fund of The Ministry of Religious Affairs and Wakfs, that was launched in 2003. The country has been facing an economic crisis for three years due to the fall in oil prices. Its foreign exchange earnings fell from 60 billion dollars in 2014 to 27.5 billion dollars at the end of last year.

Egypt's President Abdel-Fatah Al-Sisi has ordered the formation of an independent Zakat House with the purpose of raising charity funds in accordance with Sharia. A presidential decree stipulated the formation of a charity fund called Zakat House, which will have a legal jurisdiction and will be financially and administratively independent, but will be overseen by the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar. The decree aims at receiving Zakat, alms, donations, and subventions from Muslim citizens to spend them on the development of the individual and society as stipulated by Sharia law. The board of trustees which will manage the fund will include a number of public figures with backgrounds in Sharia law, economics, finance and business.

Bankers in Iran are hoping that new President Hasan Rouhani will reform the banking industry, which is saddled with dangerous levels of bad debts. A veteran of the Iranian banking sector said that at least 50 per cent of the financial institutions do not deserve to be saved. Over the past eight years both public and private banks have run up huge amounts of bad debt. These are now putting a heavy strain on the government's shrinking financial resources as it protects the most indebted players from bankruptcy. Bad debts in the banking system are estimated to average about 20 per cent, with big institutions Bank Saderat and Bank Melli in the worst positions. Interest rates on deposits will need to rise in order to combat inflation and absorb excess liquidity in the economy. Rates were raised in 2012 to 21 per cent for the same reason, but to little effect, and the cost of funding for banks is high.