Gulf bankers see expansion of Islamic banking to Asia

"Gulf bankers highlight opportunities in Islamic banking", Channel News Asia, September 17, 2006.

At the Arab Asia Financial Forum, on the sidelines of the IMF/World Bank meeting in Singapore, Gulf bankers discussed the large potential market for Islamic banking and finance in Asia. "According to the Union of Arab Banks, there are some 470 Arab banks managing assets worth more than US$1 trillion, US$632 billion of which are deposit-based." While the article does not mention the percentage of these assets that are in Shari'ah-compliant deposit accounts and investments, it is generally thought that there are between US$200 billion and US$300 billion in assets within the Shari'ah-compliant investment and banking sectors and this figure is growing at around 15 percent per year.