QIIB financing portfolio jumps
By Pratap John published 2 months ago
Original Article Source: Gulf Times
Filed Under: News Articles
The demand for funding has picked up considerably in the last six months of this year and is reflected on a 16% jump in International Islamic’s financing portfolio in H1, the bank’s chief executive officer Abdulbasit A al-Shaibei said.
“People are coming to us for funding…but we don’t have speculators anymore…we now have people looking for genuine transactions…this is what we have been focusing on,” al-Shaibei told Gulf Times yesterday.
International Islamic’s (QIIB) financing portfolio grew to QR11.8bn in June 2010 compared with QR10.1bn in the same period last year. This represents an increase of 16%.
On the bank’s non-performing loans, al-Shaibei said: “It is minimal now. The percentage of our NPLs to total loans is about 1.2%, which is much below the banking industry average. It is a very acceptable level.”
International Islamic posted a net profit of QR272.3mn in the first half of this year, up 6.7% on QR255.2mn registered in H1 2009.
The bank earned a total income of QR528.1mn in the first half of 2010, of which QR416.2mn came from financing activities.
The bank’s total assets stood at QR18.4bn at the end of June compared with QR16.6bn in the same period in 2009, representing an increase of 11%.
“We hope to maintain our performance in the next two quarters as well,” al-Shaibei said.
On the bank’s expansion programme, he said: “Locally, we plan to add more branches in locations where there is customer need. This year, we will have one more branch and in 2011 two more will be added onto our network.”
On expansion outside Qatar, al-Shaibei said: “We have an international expansion programme…but we are waiting for the right time. In Syria, the bank’s joint venture is already doing well.”
On the prospects of developing a local debt market, al-Shaibei said: “It is very important for Islamic banks in particular. For commercial banks, they have Qatar Central Bank as the lender of last resort. At Islamic bank, we don’t have that privilege.”
Al-Shaibei said he understood the authorities concerned were working on the issue.
“QCB is working on creating a custodian company for all kinds of debt papers, both Sukuk and bonds. Once that’s done, the issue of secondary debt market will automatically be in the pipeline.”