Long in the shadow of Islamic banking, Islamic trade finance plan start to grow

Although still small in comparison to the conventional global banking sector, Islamic Banking (IB) has nevertheless grown so impressively in recent years that it now seems more like a critical driver for the industry as a whole than a niche market reserved only for a small slice of the map. Indeed, as the General Council for Islamic Banks and Financial Institutions reported in early 2007, world-wide assets for IBs and Islamic Financial Institutions (IFI) now stand at over $260 billion, with financial investments totaling more than $400 billion. Year on year growth rates for the sector over the past seven years have averaged almost 15% helping to bring the total number of IBs and IFIs (IBFIs) to 267 in 2006, up from 176 in 1997. Islamic equity funds also now exceed $300 billion in value (growing an average of 25% annually over the past seven years), while Islamic sovereign and