Specialists: Islamic Sukuk Are An Alternative To Financial Instruments, 23 JAN

Specialists: Islamic Sukuk Are An Alternative To Financial Instruments

Economical  01/23/2024    Baghdad: Hussein Thaghab   Interest is growing in adopting Islamic sukuks as part of Iraq's strategic policy, as they are an important alternative to other financial instruments that depend on interest, and which can finance the deficit suffered by the federal general budget.

During the first annual conference, the Center for Banking Studies at the Central Bank of Iraq considered Islamic bonds part of Iraq's strategic policy.

He stressed the acceleration of the legislation of the “Islamic Sukuk Law in Iraq.” The participants also stressed the need to pay attention to developing appropriate legislation in order to make it successful in Iraq, and to make a media and promotional effort to spread the culture of investment in Islamic Sukuks among banks and financial institutions before the law is enacted.

Islamic banking specialist Professor Dr. Sadiq Rashid Al-Shammari pointed out that the advantages of sukuks are several, the most important of which is financing large projects that no single entity has the capacity to finance.

They are an investment channel for absorbing financial surpluses that their owners wish to invest and recover easily. They also contribute to managing liquidity in cases of deficit and surplus. If the bank has surplus liquidity, invest.

What he has in buying sukuks, and if he needs liquidity, he sells them with ease in the secondary market or the stock exchange, in addition to the fair distribution of wealth, because it links investment to reality and the real economy and enables all investors to benefit from the project’s profits in a fair way, as wealth is distributed on a large scale without Be a country among the rich, diversify your portfolio investments and spread your risks.

Investment sukuks mean that they are a document issued in the name of their owner or holder in denominations of equal value to prove the right of their owner to the financial rights and obligations they represent, and that they represent a common share in the ownership of assets designated for investment, whether objects, benefits, services, or a mixture thereof, and moral rights, debts, and money, and they do not represent debt. Issued to the bearer. 

He added that the sukuk, especially the sukuk of leased assets, are characterized by being an off-budget financing instrument, as the leased assets are owned by the sukuk holders during the term of the sukuk, and the obligation of the sukuk holder is limited to paying the rent to the sukuk holders, which is a revenue expense.

On the contrary, in the case of borrowing to finance the purchase of some assets, this leads to... To increase the value of liabilities because they are capital expenditures, this type of sukuk also has zakat and tax advantages.

He pointed out that Islamic sukuks can attract customers by providing high-quality services and providing the necessary financing for them to activate their commercial, investment, industrial and agricultural operations.

They also provide sufficient liquidity available to dealing investors, which is the desired goal of creating trust and achieving security, that is, achieving actual cooperation between those with financial surpluses.

And project owners who use these surpluses and not transfer the risk to one party or the other by creating advanced products capable of competing with the products offered by traditional banks, provided that they do not conflict with the rule of Sharia.

The Director General of the Center for Banking Studies at the Central Bank of Iraq, Dr. Bassem Abdul Hadi Hassan, highlighted the importance of submitting the draft Islamic Sukuk Law to the House of Representatives, so he is keen to discuss the role of Islamic finance and the Sukuk market in particular as a vital financial tool that contributes significantly to development.

Economic.

He added that the Central Bank of Iraq has a major role in this process by proposing the Islamic Sukuk Law and providing technical and practical assistance to the relevant authorities in the Islamic banking sector, and therefore it has become useful to learn about international experiences in this field, especially Arab ones.    https://alsabaah.iq/90893-.html