AUSTRALIA - BANKING - Middle East banks (Albaraka - QNB) turn to Australia

www.theage.com.au - MIDDLE Eastern and Asian banks are eyeing an entry into the Australian market, with several believed to have started in recent months the long process of securing a banking licence.
The move should fill a financing gap caused by some stressed European lenders scaling back their exposure to Australia.
Towards the end of last year, European groups pulled $16.7 billion from the local economy as they began feeling the funding squeeze in their home markets.

The shortfall this caused has generally been met by Asian banks.
Banking industry sources have named several overseas players as taking initial steps to secure an Australian banking licence. They include commercial Taiwanese lender Cathay United Bank and Middle Eastern commercial major Qatar National Bank.
Saudi Arabian Islamic banking specialist Al Baraka has also been named as eyeing a foothold, suggesting the federal government's efforts in promoting Australia's involvement in Islamic financing are gaining traction. Given the time and capital involved, not all banks see the licence process through, particularly as their commercial goals can quickly change. (source)

WORLD - BANKING - Shariah ‘megabank plan’ seeks to raise $1bn capital

www.gulf-times.com - The Islamic Development Bank is seeking partners to bring investment in a Shariah-compliant megabank to more than $1bn before the opening this year, allowing it to finance larger construction projects.
The financial institution, to be established with Riyadh-based Dallah Albaraka Group and the Qatari government, will issue securities that Islamic lenders can buy to manage excess funds, IDB president Ahmad Mohamed Ali said in a May 10 interview in Kuala Lumpur. The three parties signed a memorandum of understanding in April to set up the bank in Doha, Qatar, to fund roads, ports and power plants.
“An Islamic megabank will be a significant development,” Afaq Khan, Dubai-based chief executive officer of Standard Chartered’s Islamic unit, said in a telephone interview on Monday. “Such a bank would have the balance sheet, the capital and the underwriting capabilities to undertake significant projects of size.” (source)

INDONESIA - BANKING - Bahrain's Al Baraka posts 7% Q1 profit rise (plans for Indonesia)

www.arabianbusiness.com - Bahrain-based Islamic lender Al Baraka Banking Group posted a 7 percent increase in first-quarter net income, the bank said in a statement on Wednesday.
The bank, which has operations in 15 countries including Turkey, Syria and Egypt, made a profit of US$57.4m for the first-quarter, compared with US$53.5m in the first three months of 2011.
The increase in profit came despite continuing political and economic upheaval in a number of the markets in which the group operated, as well as the impact of debt issues in the euro zone, Sheikh Saleh Abdullah Kamel, chairman of Al Baraka, said. (source)

INDONESIA - BANKING - Bahrain Islamic bank eyes Indonesia deal

www.btimes.com.my - MANAMA:Bahraini Islamic lender Al Baraka Banking Group aims for 15 per cent growth in net profit this year and plans to buy a 75 per cent stake in an unlisted Indonesian bank as part of its global expansion plan.

“We are in talks with Chinese shareholders of an Indonesian bank and hope to buy close to 75 per cent stake this year,” Adnan Ahmed Yousif, Al Baraka’s CEO. (source)

INDONESIA - BANKING - Albaraka Aims Bank in Indonesia, Bahrain Islamic Bank Funds Prepare 100 Million U.S. Dollars

WWW.REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, MANAMA - Islamic banks based in Bahrain, Al Baraka Banking Group target of 15 percent earnings growth this year. In addition, the bank will expand the business by buying 75 percent stake in the bank of Indonesia that is not listed on the stock.

"We are in talks with Chinese shareholders who hold shares of a bank in Indonesia, expects to buy up to 75 percent this year," said the chief executive of Al Baraka, Adnan Ahmed Yousuf, told Reuters on Monday (5/3).  (source)

INDONESIA - BANKING - Al Baraka planning to buy bank stake

www.gulf-daily-news.com - MANAMA: Bahraini Islamic bank Al Baraka Banking Group aims for 15-per cent growth in net profit this year and plans to buy a 75pc stake in an unlisted Indonesian bank as part of its global expansion plan.

"We are in talks with Chinese shareholders of an Indonesian bank and hope to buy close to 75pc stake this year," Adnan Ahmed Yousif, Al Baraka's chief executive, said. (source)

INDONESIA - BANKING - Albaraka Seeks $100 Million Indonesia Acquisition This Year

www.bloomberg.com - Albaraka Banking Group BSC (BARKA), a Bahraini Islamic lender, is seeking to buy about 75 percent of an Indonesian bank before the end of this year, Chief Executive Officer Adnan Yousif said.
Albaraka is in talks with the Chinese shareholders of the non-Shariah compliant bank and expects to invest as much as $100 million in the deal, Manama-based Yousif said in a phone interview today.
He declined to provide the bank’s name. “We would like to do it before the end of the year,” he said. Albaraka will “inject new capital and turn it into an Islamic bank.” (source) 

INDONESIA - BANKING - Al Baraka eyes more growth, Indonesia buy

www.tradearabia.com - Bahraini Islamic lender Al Baraka Banking Group aims for 15 per cent growth in net profit this year and plans to buy a 75 per cent stake in an unlisted Indonesian bank as part of its global expansion plan.

'We are in talks with Chinese shareholders of an Indonesian bank and hope to buy close to 75 per cent stake this year,' Adnan Ahmed Yousif, Al Baraka's chief executive, told Reuters in an interview.

'Our plan is to invest around $100 million in this deal,' he said, noting that the targeted bank, which he declined to name, is a conventional lender that will eventually be converted to Islamic.  (source)

INDONESIA - BANKING - ABG net income surges 10 per cent to $

www.gulf-daily-news.com - MANAMA: Al Baraka Banking Group (ABG) managed to weather the storm of both international and regional turmoil to move ahead last year.

And the Bahrain-based Islamic bank is now looking to expand its operations into Indonesia, China and India as part of its medium-term strategy to enter into large and promising markets where it can offer innovative services and products.

Yesterday it announced that it achieved a net income of $212 million last year, an increase of 10 per cent on the income achieved in 2010.  (source)

WORLD - CAPITAL MARKETS - The rise of Wakalah

By Adnan Halawi, Team Leader – Fixed Income, Zawya

 

05 September 2011
Global Sukuk Review: August 2011
Despite the summer holidays accompanied by the month of Ramadan, the Islamic bonds market witnessed noticeable activity in August 2011. There were some launches as well as announcements that some much-delayed and long-awaited sukuk would finally be issued, as early as September or in the fourth quarter of the year. A total of USD6 billion of sukuk were sold in August, according to the Zawya Sukuk Monitor, compared to USD4.7 issued in the same period of 2010. (source)

BANKING - Race is on (Bank Muamalat)

Race is on It looks like the race to acquire a chunk of Indonesia’s Bank Muamalat is narrowing, with British
bank Standard Chartered apparently in pole position.  

Bank Muamalat was Indonesia’s first Shari’ah compliant bank, starting operations in 1992. It now serves about three million customers in Indonesia and Malaysia and had piqued the interest of Qatar’s largest Islamic bank, Qatar Islamic Bank and local operator Bank Mega, as well as Standard Chartered because of its strategic positioning in what many analysts regard as one of the most significant Islamic banking markets of the future. (source)

BANKING - Gulf banks tackling Shariah disputes to boost investment

Arabian Gulf banks say they are more ready to accept Asian Islamic debt as Shariah-compliant, allowing them to invest in a market that has issued twice as much sukuk as the Middle East this year.

Institutions from the two regions are working to overcome differences over whether southeast Asian notes comply with Islam’s ban on interest, according to Albaraka Banking Group, Bahrain’s biggest publicly traded lender, and Asian Finance Bank, the Malaysian arm of Qatar Islamic Bank. Last year, Saudi Arabia’s Al Rajhi Group helped Cagamas Bhd, Malaysia’s largest mortgage holder, structure a sukuk after Gulf investors balked at debt sold by the same issuer in 2009. (source)

BANKING - Indonesia Targets Persian Gulf to Boost Assets: Islamic Finance

Indonesia's Foreign Ministry and central bank are seeking investment from the Persian Gulf to meet its target of increasing Shariah-compliant banking assets by 35 percent this year.

The delegation may meet officials in the Middle East as soon as this month, with Saudi Arabia and Kuwait the most likely destinations, Mulya Siregar, the Jakarta-based director of Islamic services at Bank Indonesia, said in a May 31 interview. (source)

BANKING - Bahrain's Baraka to buy Indonesian bank in 2011

Bahraini Islamic lender Al Baraka plans to buy an Indonesian bank this year for around $100m and has identified up to four possible options, its chief executive said on Tuesday.

"We sent in early February a delegation...to follow up on our expansion plans in Indonesia. I think the Indonesian market is a good market," Adnan Yousif said.

"We want to buy a bank. We have looked into several options and now we have three or four banks that we are eyeing, from which we will buy one bank."

"It is a classical bank and we will turn it into an Islamic bank. Our budget for that is around $100m...it will be [finalised] in the third quarter of this year," Yousif said. (full story)

BANKING - Gulf lenders eye Indonesia acquisitions (ABG - QIB - AFB - StanChart saadiq)

Dubai: Albaraka Banking Group and Qatar Islamic Bank aim to acquire Sharia-compliant lenders in Indonesia as the central bank estimates the nation's Islamic assets will increase by as much as 55 per cent this year.

Albaraka, Bahrain's biggest publicly traded bank, plans to spend $100 million on an acquisition, Chief Executive Officer Adnan Ahmad Yousuf said in a March 28 interview in Istanbul. (full story)

BANKING - Kamel re-elected ABG chairman (plans Indonesia)

Saleh Abdullah Kamel 

By MAHMOOD RAFIQUE | ARAB NEWS

Published: Mar 24, 2011 23:00 Updated: Mar 24, 2011 23:00

MANAMA: The shareholders of the AlBaraka Banking Group re-elected Saleh Abdullah Kamel as the group’s chairman of the for another three year term during a meeting held at Sheraton Hotel on Wednesday. The shareholders’s meeting was attended by 91% of the group’s total shareholding.

The meeting also approved the payment of the dividend of $118.57 million for the year 2010 and shareholders discussed at the ordinary meeting the report submitted by the board of directors on the group’s activities during the financial year. (full story)

BANKING - Arqaam to help Indonesian banks find buyers

About five conventional and three Islamic lenders may be looking to help raise money for growth

Dubai : Arqaam Capital Ltd, a Dubai-based investment bank, wants to help other Indonesian lenders find investors in the Gulf region after advising PT Bank Kesawan on the sale of a stake in itself to Qatar National Bank SAQ. (full story)

BANKING - Plan To Issue Mega Islamic Bank Licences Still In Progress

KUALA LUMPUR, March 8 (Bernama) -- Bank Negara Malaysia's (BNM) plan to issue up to two mega Islamic bank licences is still on progress, says its deputy governor, Datuk Mohd Razif Abdul Kadir.

"The plan is still in progress. We need to find the right investors," he said, when asked on progress of the plan to issue mega Islamic bank licences. (full story)

BANKING - Islamic megabank gets Bahrain, Malaysia approvals

Feb 16 (Reuters) - A long-touted Islamic megabank has received approval from Bahrain and a preliminary green light from Malaysia to begin operations, an organizer said on Wednesday.

Saudi Arabia's Sheikh Saleh Kamel -- who is founder and chairman of Bahrain-based Islamic bank Al Baraka BARKA.BH and spearheaded the megabank initiative -- said the venture is still in discussions with Qatar to obtain a licence.

The entity will likely have an authorized capital of $3 billion, a third of which will be raised in a private placement. (source)

BANKING - ABG Albaraka to spend US 50 million in Indonesia

Albaraka cuts size of March sukuk

Albaraka Banking Group reduced the size of a March sukuk programme to $250 million.

Dubai:  Albaraka Banking Group reduced the size of a March sukuk programme to $250 million (Dh918 million)-$300 million from the planned $500 million, Chief Executive Officer Adnan Ahmad Yousuf said. (source)