Sharjah Islamic Bank repays 400m$

Sharjah Islamic Bank (SIB), a leading shariah compliant commercial bank in the UAE, has successfully repaid a USD 400 million sukuk. The Sukuk had been raised in May 2011 under challenging market circumstances. The funds raised under the sukuk were used for general corporate purposes and business expansion of SIB.

Mr. Mohamed Abdulla, CEO of SIB, thanked the investors of the Sukuk for their trust in SIB as a strong regional credit, holding investment grade ratings of A3 by Moody’s and BBB+ by S&P and Fitch Ratings. He said “SIB believes that the capital markets to be an opportunity for growth for Islamic Banks and we, at SIB, would look to tap the markets at appropriate times. Sukuk allow us to diversify our funding sources and engage with investors on various opportunities.”

Mr. Ahmed Saad, Deputy CEO of SIB commented that “The bank’s liquidity remains strong whereas asset quality measured through coverage ratio and NPLs are in line with peers. SIB chose to repay the sukuk through its internal sources evidencing our excellent liquidity position and would look to engage with capital markets investors, under the USD 3 billion sukuk programme in the future. SIB has been tapping Sukuk markets since 2006, being one of theearliest sukuk issuers in the world”

SIB currently has two Sukuk of USD 500 million outstanding which are set to mature in 2018 and 2020 respectively.