"Bankers face Mecca", Sunday Times (UK), October 15, 2006
The Sunday Times Business section provides an article about Islamic finance estimating its size at $1 billion growing at 25 percent per year. The article takes the position of the managing director of Dar al Istithmar, a shari'ah consultancy co-founded by Deutsche Bank, Humayon Dar who was quoted by the Times, "The clergy have been working with western institutions — the bearers of capitalism. There is now a fine kind of marriage emerging between the Islamic world and western banks in the form of sharia-compliant finance." While Mr. Dar sees possibilities to Islamize almost all western financial products, other Shari'ah scholars are more skeptical. One product raising significant skepticism, recently unveiled by Deutsche Bank, is Shari'ah-compliant derivatives.
"Islamic Banking Industry Well Capitalised, Says Dr. Zeti", Bernama, October 16, 2006
The Governor of Bank Negara Malaysia, the Malaysian Central Bank, Dr. Zeti Akhtar Aziz says the Islamic banks in Malaysia are well capitalized. Their risk-weighted capital ratio is 14.8 percent at the end of August and the non-performing ratio is 4.2 percent.
"HSBC unit picks Malaysia as global hub for takaful business", Yahoo! News (from AFP), October 16, 2006
HSBC's Malaysian takaful company HSBC Amanah Takaful Sdn Bhd has announced plans to use it Malaysian base as a base to expand its takaful business globally. Takaful is similar to mutual insurance, with additional restrictions that make it Shari'ah-compliant.
"DIFX is world's largest exchange for sukuk with Investment Dar listing", AMEInfo, October 16, 2006
The Dubai International Financial Exchange (DIFX) has $4.11 billion in sukuk listed on the exchange with the issue of $150 million by The Investment Dar Company K.S.C. (TID) today. Between January and June 2006, $4.6 billion in non-soverign sukuk was issued by Gulf-based issuers, more than double the amount for the same period in 2005.
No comments:
Post a Comment