Beware of Financial Jihadist Claims in Post-Pandemic Market
posted by Christopher W. Holton The world economy and financial markets have been beset by an unprecedented collapse brought about by the Wuhan virus pandemic. In such environments charlatans and swindlers often move in to take advantage. One particularly risk for investors will be promoters of shariah-compliant finance. Shariah complaint finance is a form of […]
More Propaganda from the Shariah Finance Industry
posted by Christopher W. Holton Bloomberg, one of the biggest financial news conglomerates in the world, has published a story about a report out of Australia by Melbourne’s Deakin Business School, which essentially calls for all investors to consider Shariah Compliant Financial products as safe havens during times of crisis. This is a tired old, […]
The recent terrorist attacks in Paris, Brussels and Turkey are causing a sharp drop off in demand from North American travelers for Mediterranean cruises, Norwegian Cruise Line warned on Monday. http://www.ft.com/fastft/2016/08/09/norwegian-slashes-outlook-as-terrorism-hits-booking/
Excellent analyses from Kevin Freeman and Michael Del Rosso: http://globaleconomicwarfare.com/2013/09/1305/
There has been a considerable amount of attention on the new Muslim Brotherhood regime in Egypt. Some of that attention–not enough–has been focused on the inevitable decline of the Egyptian economy with the onset of Islamization. (Without enormous amounts of oil for foreigners of superior capability and intellect to exploit, every Islamist nation falls on […]
Craziness for Profit: Shariah Scholar/Advisor Mufti Taqi Usmani Blames Commodities Markets for Financial Crisis
At SFW we have covered Mufti Taqi Usmani extensively over the years. He has long been considered one of the most prominent and influential Shariah scholars in the world of Shariah Compliant Finance. According to many observers, critics and market participants alike, Usmani is the Shariah finance […]
Typical Propaganda on Islamic Bonds from Saudi State-Controlled Media
The article linked below has to be taken with a large grain of salt since it comes from the Saudi Gazette. There is nothing even resembling a free, independent press in Saudi Arabia and the Saudi royals have a huge vested interest in promoting Shariah-Compliant Finance both in the kingdom and globally. Not surprisingly, this […]
Some REALLY Bad Ideas on How to Solve America’s Debt Problems
Not surprisingly, the financial jihadists are promoting Shariah as the solution to America’s debt problems. We’ve seen this before. Back in 2008, in the wake of the subprime mortgage debacle and near-financial meltdown, the financial jihadists insisted that Shariah-compliant finance would have avoided the whole mess. Then, in 2009, defaulting on sukuk (Islamic bonds) just […]
The press in Pakistan are reporting that the governor of the country’s central bank, Shahid Kardar, has resigned. It was unclear exactly when or why Kardar, the governor of the State Bank of Pakistan, resigned, but some reports indicate that he had differences with the government on key policy issues. Pakistan is in a fiscal […]
There is general outrage in the US about the revelation, which the US Federal Reserve tried to keep secret, that a Libyan bank got 73 loans from the US taxpayers during the 2008 financial crisis… http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/top-business-stories/how-a-libya-owned-bank-borrowed-from-fed-in-crisis/article1966694/
Islamic private equity firms face a reality check in the wake of the financial crises, delegates at the Islamic Financial Services Board summit were told. The key phrase: The same was true for conventional and Islamic private equity businesses… http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=288336
Financial jihadists are fond of claiming that Shariah-compliance provides insulation from the effects of economic crisis. This is not true, but rarely do we see an admission on this point from anyone in the Islamic world. Today there is an article which admits that “Islamic finance” is not immune to the impact of economic and […]
This article is from MoneyLaundering.com. It tends to overplay the amount of cooperation that the US is getting from the UAE in our opinion, but it also contains some good information. These particular lines are revealing of Dubai’s status as a financial rogue nation: “…every major” Dubai real estate project “has been, in part, financed […]
Though The Economist continues to actively ignore many of the fundamental concerns surrounding Shariah-Compliant Finance, the article linked below about the Sukuk market is actually fairly well done, especially when one considers that The Economist has basically been nothing but a shameless cheerleader for Shariah Finance heretofore… The article points out many of the problems […]
Charles Ridley, a British citizen living in Bahrain, has been charged with massively defrauding Dubai Islamic Bank. He made an impassioned plea to defend himself in court in Dubai and actually quoted from the Koran in doing so. (Evidently, Mr. Ridley, despite living in the Middle East for many years, is ignorant of the fact […]
Another UAE Sukuk Issuer Looks to “Restructure”
Over the past two years, there have been numerous defaults on Islamic bonds (better known as Sukuk). In fact, default rates on Sukuk are apparently higher than those of conventional bonds. This is likely due to the higher fees associated with Sukuk which are arrived at from a series of convoluted machinations designed to keep […]
Note how the experience of IIB flies in the face of all the claims from the financial jihadists that they offer safe haven from economic and financial crisis… Last year was a difficult year for the world economy and financial markets, and global financial crisis hit Bahrain-based Shariah-compliant International Investment Bank (IIB) also as it […]
Jordan continues to move more into the grasp of Shariah-Compliant Finance, this time evidenced by the Jordanian government’s borrowing of $100 million from Jordan Islamic Bank. The country’s finance minister claims that they did this due to Shariah-Compliant finance’s performance during the world economic crisis. He must not be paying close attention… http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/business/news/article_1539365.php/Jordan-government-turns-to-Islamic-banks-for-borrowing?
Sales of bonds that comply with Islamic laws will remain “weaker” this year as investors shun riskier, higher-yielding assets on concern governments will struggle to repay debt. Sales of the bonds known as sukuk have totalled $564 million so far this year, compared with $2.5 billion for the first quarter last year, according to data […]
Most of Kuwait’s multibillion-dollar investment company industry could be wiped out by debt repayments on the finance houses’ leveraged investments made before the recession, senior bankers have warned. Read more at the Financial Times… http://www.ft.com/cms/s/87f5a690-1f19-11df-9584-00144feab49a,Authorised=false.html?_i_location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ft.com%2Fcms%2Fs%2F0%2F87f5a690-1f19-11df-9584-00144feab49a.html&_i_referer=
Kuwait Finance House, the emirate’s leading Islamic bank, said on Tuesday its 2009 profits dropped by 24 percent from the previous year due to the continued impact of the global financial crisis. This earnings report comes amid continued bogus claims by financial jihadists that Shariah-Compliance provides protection against that very same financial crisis… http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5336111&fSectionId=613&fSetId=662
As we reported not long ago, one of the oldest banks in Kuwait, BKME, will soon complete the conversion process from legitimate, civilized finance to Shariah Compliance. Now we learn that in justifying this move, they are making claims about the durability of Shariah-Compliant financial institutions in the face of economic crisis: “Islamic banking is […]
Dubai Debts Prompt Review of Shariah Finance
SFW has long maintained–and pointed out–that Shariah-Compliant Finance is in now way immune to market and economic forces and thus cannot provide a safe haven in the event of economic or financial crisis. We point this out because so many financial jihadists routinely commit fraud by claiming that Shariah Finance is protected by the principles […]
In the civilized world, this would be referred to as a “default.” But in the world of Shariah, it’s simply called a “standstill.” Creditors have little choice but to go along with the swindle that Dubai has perpetrated on them. Sooner or later, maybe Western financiers will discover that all of the added but often […]
A few years ago, Dubai World floated an Islamic bond (Sukuk) to acquire the British port company P&O. The results of that acquisition and the methodology became part of the subsequent default and bailout of Dubai World’s sukuk portfolio. What the article linked below alludes to without coming right out and saying it, is the […]
10 Sukuk Defaults at Year-End 2009
While it has received virtually zero coverage in the Western financial media, by researching Islamic blogs, we have come across a very interesting piece of information: there were 10 sukuk (Islamic bond) defaults at the end of 2009. We all know about the Dubai sukuk default, but there were evidently several others, including one involving […]
Dubai in retrospect: Don’t Blame Shariah!
The Dubai World default on sukuk, also known as “Islamic bonds,” was centered on financial products which were approved by Shariah scholars. Making investments Shariah-Compliant was supposed to protect investors from crisis and calamity. We heard and read such claims from financial jihadists over and over again after the Subprime collapse. But Shariah-Compliance not only […]
Shariah finance: The deadly Jihadist weapon with a dollar sign
It is highly appropriate that SFW end 2009 by sharing the latest work from one of the true heroes of the Western world in the fight against Shariah: David Yerushalmi. Mr. Yerushalmi’s essay in the Washington Examiner provides both a primer for those unfamiliar with the issue of Shariah Finance, as well as an update […]
Below is a link to an article that can only be described as absurd. The article on the Trade Arabia web site points out that “Islamic” Finance is spreading and growing by leaps and bounds. This much is true and that is quite an unfortunate reality for many reasons: • The purpose of Shariah Finance […]
Dubai’s golden sands lose their luster
“Investors trapped by the financial storm in the United Arab Emirates are in unknown legal territory as they try to protect their billions.” (The Times, 10 December 2009) The Dubai default debacle demonstrates in stark detail how the lack of transparency and failure to disclose relevant facts make Shariah Finance risky. Long ago–decades ago–the rest […]
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