DOHA, 15 March 2006 — Gulf Finance House (GFH) and Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB) yesterday announced a landmark agreement to launch Qatar’s first dedicated Islamic investment bank. A formal application for authorization and a license was submitted on Sunday to the Qatar Financial Center Regulatory Authority.
The investment bank will be launched with an authorized capital of $1 billion and paid up capital of $500 million. GFH and QIB will each own 15 percent of the new bank. The remaining 70 percent of the equity will be offered by GFH and QIB to their clients beginning this week. Listing of the bank is planned in the near future in accordance with stock exchange regulations.
Commenting on this major new development in Qatar’s banking industry, Esam Janahi, chief executive officer and board member, GFH, said: “Our view is that Qatar is poised for substantial economic growth for many years to come and the generation of capital in Qatar will help to drive economic growth in the region as a whole. It is a sound strategic move for GFH to establish a significant presence on the ground in Qatar’s banking sector, one which will help source a number of high quality opportunities in Qatar as well as offer Qatari investors more opportunity outside Qatar.
This new bank will be able to participate along side GFH in much larger transactions. The trend in the US and Europe is for private equity houses to pool their resources through the formation of consortiums to bid for assets that previously they could not buy because they did not have the capital to do so. We recognize the importance of this trend and have decided to be the first bank in the GCC to take specific action to position our clients to be able to complete substantial projects and acquisitions leading to greater fees and income for both Gulf Finance House, QIB and shareholders of the new bank.
We strongly believe that in this region over the next few years, we will increasingly see more regional cooperation within the financial sector, with partnerships and strategic alliances being formed to promote the growth of Islamic finance and to more effectively utilize the region’s rapidly increasing capital in the drive to pursue economic transformation and growth.”
Commenting on the alliance with GFH and the establishment of the new bank, Salah Al-Jaidah, general manager, QIB, said: “Qatar is one of the fastest growing economies in the region and is home to some of the largest regional projects and investment opportunities. We are confident that our alliance with Gulf Finance House presents a unique and winning formula, bringing together QIB’s knowledge of the Qatari market and GFH’s experience as one of the GCC’s leading investment banks. With our combined knowledge and experience the new bank will get off to a flying start and we expect it to make a positive contribution to the development of Qatar in a very short period of time. Without a doubt, this initiative will create a powerful force in Qatar’s banking sector and we are very pleased and excited to be part of it.”
The new investment bank will originate and package Shariah-compliant investment opportunities in infrastructure and real estate direct investment, private equity and venture capital direct investment, managed funds of listed equity and debt securities, structured products, and corporate finance advisory services.
Commenting on the application, Al-Jaidah said, “ It was a pleasure to meet Phillip Thorpe, chairman and chief executive officer, QFCRA and his team and we can only compliment them on the professional manner with which they dealt with the application which bodes well for the future of the Qatar Financial Center.”
