From Reuters: Malaysian Islamic banks on Thursday launched a standard agreement for commodity murabaha deposit accounts between banks and corporates, aiming to remove a key barrier to the sector’s growth.

The Association of Islamic Banking Institutions Malaysia — which groups banks such as Bank Islam, CIMB Islamic and the Malaysian units of Kuwait Finance House and Al Rajhi– said the master contract would be similar to an interbank murabaha agreement launched earlier………….Full Article: Source

From Menafn.com: Nomura Holdings Inc., Japan’s largest brokerage, plans to step up efforts to tap demand for investing in Islamic financial markets, including those in the Middle East, a major business daily here reported Thursday.

Nomura will expand its operations in Malaysia, adding stock trading and research to its services in that Southeast Asian country, according to the Nikkei Shimbun………….Full Article: Source

From Khaleejtimes.com: Saudi Arabian banks are resilient to the global economic downturn due to the relative strength of the region, solid fundamentals and a conservative regulatory environment, said Nomura, which began coverage of the Saudi banking sector with a positive outlook.

Saudi banks are an attractive way of taking advantage of a rising interest rate environment, Nomura said in a note dated August 19………….Full Article: Source

From Saudigazette.com.sa: Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) bonds and Sukuk volume reached $18.4 billion in the first half of 2009, an increase of 37 percent compared to the same period last year, Kuwait Financial Center (Markaz) said in its latest report on bonds.
The increase was fuelled as a result of new issuances by either sovereign or corporations that are fully or largely owned by the governments, which together represented 92.1 percent of the total issuance during the period………….Full Article: Source

From Bernama: Islamic finance will generate greater interest this year when the global economic outlook improves.

RAM Holdings Bhd’s group chief economist Dr Yeah Kim Leng said investors would seek alternative instruments that can mitigate risk of unsupervised leverage and debt creation………….Full Article: Source

From Bernama: Bank Islam Malaysia Bhd expects to be launching innovative products both for the individual consumer and corporate sector in keeping with the growing demand for Islamic financial products.

Its general manager of Treasurer Division, Norashikin Kassim, said the bank was constantly innovating products to tap the US$1 trillion global Islamic finance market………….Full Article: Source

From Zawya Dow Jones: Government-owned Dubai World holds almost $60 billion in liabilities on its balance sheet, raising concerns that the sheikdom’s debts may be far greater than initially thought, recent figures show.

At the end of last year, the conglomerate had 217.8 billion U.A.E. dirhams ($59.1 billion) in liabilities against AED365.8 billion in assets, according to a statement posted on NASDAQ Dubai’s Web site on July 31………….Full Article: Source

From GMANews.TV: Three foreign investors are interested in possibly securing a 40 percent stake in the Al-Amanah Islamic Investment Bank of the Philippines (Al Amanah), the lender’s chairman and chief executive said.

The bank, which is wholly-owned by state-run Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP), will increase its capital to P5 billion in the next five years from P1 billion, its chairman and chief executive Armando O. Samia said………….Full Article: Source

From Bworldonline.com: State-run Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) is infusing capital into the Al-Amanah Islamic Investment Bank as part of a plan to turn around the country’s lone Islamic bank’s fortunes.

Armando O. Samia, newly installed chairman and chief executive officer of Al-Amanah, said DBP, the country’s sixth largest bank, would infuse P1 billion in Al-Amanah as soon as it obtains central bank approval of its five-year plan for the bank………….Full Article: Source

From Tradearabia.com: Visa and Arab International Bank (AIB) have launched Egypt’s first Visa Classic and Gold credit cards in euros.

The product was developed following an AIB consumer survey that identified market demand for Visa credit cards in euros. The cards eliminate all charges related to currency exchange, as they already use the common European currency, the euro………….Full Article: Source

From Bi-me.com: It’s official. The IFN 2009 Issuers & Investors Asia Forum is the Islamic finance industry’s largest ever event.

The recently concluded three-day forum, from the 3-5 August in Kuala Lumpur, saw 1,198 unique delegates from all over the world………….Full Article: Source

From Menafn.com: The 16th Annual World Islamic Banking Conference will be held in Bahrain on December sixth, said a statement by organizers on Thursday.

According to the organizers, the three-day meeting will discuss the future of Islamic banking in light of the global economic situations such the current world financial crisis………….Full Article: Source

From Ameinfo.com: Capital Intelligence (CI), the international credit rating agency, today announced that it has lowered both the long-term foreign currency rating and the financial strength rating of Saudi Arabia’s Bank Al Jazira (BAJ) from A- to BBB+.
The short-term foreign currency rating of A2 is unchanged, as is the support rating of 2………….Full Article: Source