Issue 22 July / August 2013

Banks need to start developing their mobile-payments strategies now, according to global experts Mohammed Badi, Laurent Desmangles, Alenka Grealish, Sushil Malhotra, and Carl Rutstein Mobile payments and mobile wallets— when they come into full force—will affect a wide variety of stakeholders: mobile network operators, handset makers, operating-system providers, retailers, consumers, and, of course, financial institutions. Yet many banks are in …

MUSTAK PARKER reports on a plea for ‘a dedicated, qualified, modern, single globally accepted Shariah Committee’ Kuala Lumpur and Dushanbe are not exactly known for their revolutionary zeal. It is in these two capitals, however, that the patriarch of Islamic development finance, Dr Ahmad Mohamed Ali, President of the Islamic Development Bank (IDB) Group, perhaps the most unlikeliest revolutionary in …

The traditional model of correspondent banking is changing as the relationship between global and local banks evolves. But how and what is driving this? PETER JAMESON from Bank of America Merrill Lynch analyses the landscape and considers what the future might hold For many years, industry specialists have suggested that correspondent banking is dead and that now is the time …

Banks in the GCC have continued to grow and outperform international banks, according to a new study The banking industry in the Middle East settled at single digit revenue growth in 2012 with a 6.9 per cent increase, although the rise in profits was slightly higher at 8.1 per cent, stemming largely from extraordinary income sources. These were among the …