Sunday, May 09, 2010

Should this blog include a newsletter? Islamic venture capital

I received a suggestion from a reader this weekend for a regular email newsletter of this blog, to complement the blog itself and the ability to receive the blog posts via RSS feed. I have thought some about providing a newsletter either weekly (with the week's posts and a teaser) or an email newsletter sent out when I post a new post. However, I would appreciate reader's feedback on whether this would be useful and what the most useful frequency of email newsletter updates would be. Please comment either on this post or by emailing me at blake@sharingrisk.org

Rushdi Siddiqui's latest article in Gulf News deals with Venture Capital, specifically the lack of it within Islamic fiannce. I wholeheartedly agree with him on that point.

Lahem al-Nasser of Asharq Al-Awsat has a dream for Islamic finance:
"I have a dream that one day Islamic financial institutions will operate based on the principle of partnership rather than debt in the sense that all parties would share both risk and profit. I have a dream that Islamic financial institutions will not base profit on usury that will cause them to be weak and fragile.

"I have a dream that one day Islamic financial institutions will have clear strategies to set up important development projects in their societies in a way that contributes to reducing unemployment, increasing productivity in society, improving technology and adopting and strengthening creative ideas. I have a dream that Islamic financial institutions will create genuine products rather than alternative ones through which they could change the conventional view of the financial institution. I have a dream that the joint Islamic financial market will be based on relying on its own tools away from imitating derivatives, bonds or other tools of Islamic banking.
[...]
"I have a dream that Islamic financial corporations will be able to convey Islam's civilized message to the world just as our merchant Muslim ancestors did. I have a dream that one day Muslim businessmen will make this dream come true.


Other News

  • The government of Dubai formed a committee of creditors as we enter a week that will see the maturity of one of Nakheel's sukuk (Thursday).
  • Malaysia may sell 10-year dollar-denominated bonds in June, although it was not specified whether these would be conventional bonds or sukuk.
  • Emirates Steel is close to receiving $2 billion in loans, of which $1.5 billion is expected to come in the form of Islamic finance facilities. The closing is expected in June.
  • An article describes the limited clarity in takaful that has hampered the industry's growth.
  • Nomura International plc entered into a $50 million commodity murabaha transaction as its debut transaction in Islamic finance.
  • The Islamic Development Bank is planning to boost cooperation with India, which is not an OIC member.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

A monthly newsletter --nothing that overburdens you, but definitely your reads and insight is top notch, so materials and update that keeps folks up to date.

Best,
Samy

Unknown said...

A weekly newsletter is better I think. It's not too pushy, yet it updates on a weekly basis. A monthly one will make it outdated by that time. A daily one is useful for market analysis, but since you are not writing everyday, a daily one is not recommended.

By the way, I don't know if you remember when I first added you on Linkedin, I told you about an Islamic finance website that I am putting together, and I am looking for "contributors" writing op-ed. I will send you a proposal in a couple of weeks to see if you might be interested... I can give you a sneak peak to what the website looks like through a Linkedin message.

Always a pleasure to read your posts!

Zied