IslamicFinance.de

Etqaan Shariah Capital Partners is closing its first Etqaan Shariah Fund. TNI and KAMCO are managing the Fund with $20m, and will persist to fundraise in regional and international markets, subject to country specific regulatory approvals.
The Fund will invest between $20m and $40m in six to eight portfolio companies in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, and will look to primarily take majority stakes in leading regional businesses.
Legal counsel was given by Dewey and LeBoeuf LLP during the formation of the Fund. Fund administrator will be Deutsche Bank (Cayman) Limited.

KSB Capital Group is searching investors in an open-ended Shariah-compliant investment fund targeting shares listed on the Qatari bourse.
Qatar is a promising market for investment as 90% of the companies listed there are paying out dividends to their shareholders. The statement came from Ibrahim al-Olwan, the company’s deputy chief executive.

Standard & Poor's Ratings Services stated that Asia's solid economic growth and surging population will urge for significant developments and upgrades of its infrastructure.
It appears that Asian economies need US$8 trillion over the next decade to fully address the region's basic infrastructure needs, including developments in areas such as water, transportation, and energy.

It appears that the Public Investment Fund (PIF) authorized SR4 billion financing facility for the Qasr Khozam development project of Dar Al-Arkan Real-Estate Development Company.
Tadawul website stated that this funding will contribute to the project by increasing the speed of the development operations and pushing ahead to the next phase of sending evacuation notifications, the compensation and transfer of ownership of the properties located in the project area.

A report shows that at least seven renminbi funds for international investors have been launched in the past year.
The funds are adressed to at non-mainland Chinese wishing to add renminbi-denominated bonds to their portfolios and contain products launched by AllianceBernstein, Barclays, BEA Union Investment, Guinness Atkinson and Bosera.
Renmibi funds are still trusted, as the currency remains a better bet than many other investment choices.

The process of opening Australia to Islamic investment was started by a Muslim wealth manager. The first Shariah compliant equity fund was launched in Australia. The fund is being advertised to local investors as a socially-responsible option.
The aim of Crescent Wealth is to appoint a raft of investment products, including superannuation, that will offer Australians access to the previously untapped $1.4 trillion Islamic investment market.

It is possible for Turkey to appear as a key market for Islamic finance while Asia continues to drive the industry’s growth but markets are still evaluating the full impact of the global downturn on the sector.
Because of the recent growth of the sector together with the launch of several Islamic funds and a law granting tax neutrality to sukuk products, it is tought that Turkey will be the next growth market for sharia finance.

Malawi's Vanguard Life Assurance is placed to introduce their so called first Shari'ah compliant pension fund.
The fund will invest in conventional investment vehicles that do not put in jeopardy Shari'ah stipulations.

Emirates NBD's asset management arm and Man Group will tie-up in order to see the hedge fund firm manage one of the lender's sharia-compliant funds.
Emirates Islamic Alternative Strategies Fund will be taken over by Man Investments. The assets will be assigned to the Man GLG Multi-Strategy Fund.
Deon Vernooy, senior executive officer of Emirates NBD Asset Management, revealed the fact that the Emirates Islamic Alternative Strategies Fund is now worth $20 million.

Global Islamic fund assets under management (AuM) advanced 7.6 % to $58 billion in 2010, with concentration in equities accounting for 39 per cent of the assets, but fetching new money into equities is demanding and difficult.
The growth is owed to market performance and partially on account of new money inflows.
The year 2010 was a record for Sukuk having issuance of $50bn.
The addressable world for Islamic fund managers is beyond $500bn, growing by 10-15pc annually. In the GCC, for example, liquid wealth of Sharia sensitive investors is anticipated to add more than $70bn to Islamic funds by 2013.

Bonanza Portfolio Ltd together with Pragmatic Wealth Management Pvt Ltd has launched India's premier Shariah Portfolio Management Services. The name of the service is Bonanza-Pragmatic Shariah fund and is appointed to offer an alternative investment opportunity to 150 million Indian Muslims.
The fund is going to invest only in permissible sectors like automobiles, construction & reality, healthcare, metal & mines, power & utility, consumer goods & services, capital goods & industrials, information technology & oil & gas.
The fund will be 100% equity based.

London Central Portfolio has issued a sharia-compliant residential London property fund.
It seems that the fund will be adressed to some of the more wealthy clients, both domestic and overseas investors, who are looking to invest in property in the capital. The statement was given by Naomi Heaton, chief executive for LCP.

HSBC's Saudi Arabia wholesale and investment banking unit has made known a new open-ended Shariah compliant fund - HSBC Amanah Commodity Index Fund. The fund is purposed at producing capital growth over the long term by investing in commodities in a Shariah compliant manner, whereby the Fund will track the performance of a commodity index.

The 2nd Quarter 2011 issue of the Malaysian ICM quarterly bulletin published by the Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) is now available online at:
http://www.sc.com.my/eng/html/icm/11_2Q_msianicm.pdf

Discussions on strengthening the Islamic funds and investments industry and building international growth by tapping into new jurisdictions will be held at the 7th annual World Islamic Funds and Financial Markets Conference (WIFFMC 2011).
The theme of the conference is intitled ‘achieving international scale and creating a vibrant Islamic financial market and re-invigorating the Islamic investments industry’. It will brinf together more than 400 key players, regulators and thought leaders in the industry on September 26-27 in Bahrain.

One of the most efficient channels to optimise non-core corporate funds is still corporate, institutional cash management.
The past month has seen extreme volatility in global markets, appearing from debt woes in Europe and the US.
As a key Islamic investment management company, AIIMAN (Asian Islamic Investment Management Sdn Bhd) underlined the opportunity for companies, institutions, and even high net-worth individuals operating businesses, to acknowledge the option of outsourcing their short-term cash management or treasury function to external fund managers in such instances.

Arcapita Bank had a net income of $50.2 million, registering a return to profitability for the bank, which along with its peers in the private equity industry, has gone through a tough operating environment in the aftermath of the financial crisis which began in 2008.
Beside its core business of deal-by-deal investments, Arcapita has made advancement in building its funds product offering, building on its track record in the industrial warehousing sector to expand several funds during the year, in Asia, in Europe and in the Middle East.

The Oasis Group is advancing very fact in expanding its overseas operations and plans to open an office in London later this year as part of its expansion strategy.
Michael Bear, the Lord Mayor of the City of London, stated that high level financial and business services in South Africa and London are on a fast track for much closer cooperation. He also added that this will benefit both countries.
Oasis made its most critical move when it opened its office in Ireland, Dublin. Today it has six funds listed on the Irish stock exchange including its two flagship funds - the Oasis Global Equity Fund and the Oasis Crescent Global Equity Fund; the Oasis Crescent International Property Equity Feeder Fund; the Oasis Crescent Global Income Fund; the Oasis Crescent Global Low Equity Balanced Fund; and the Oasis Global Money Market Fund.

Public Mutual revealed that it is going to launch the sukuk fund that will invest at least 75% of its net asset value in a portfolio of Sukuk taking positions in both sovereign and corporate Sukuk with the balance entrusted in Islamic money market instruments.
The firm is also initiating a conventional Asian emerging growth equity fund, which will have a small-cap Asian emerging market focus and a conventional global bond fund.

Saturna Capital Corporation fullfills 25 years of Amana Income Fund, that has now reached $1.3 billion. The sister fund Amana Growth is the largest such fund at $1.9 billion in assets and is also managed by Saturna.
Amana Income's 25-year run is rare in the US mutual fund industry.
The Amana Income Fund has been given three Lipper Best Fund Awards: for the three-year period ended 31 December 2006, among 180 equity income funds; and for the three-year and five-year periods ended 31 December 2007, among 198 and 135 equity income funds.
The Fund has also welcomed five Failaka Islamic Fund awards in various categories over the past few years: three Best US Islamic Fund awards in 2008 (sweeping the one-, three- and five-year periods); Best Global Equity Fund in 2009 (for the three-year period); and Best Global Equity Fund again in 2010 (for the five-year period).