'Market share of Islamic bank assets can hit 40pc by 2020'

By LIDIANA ROSLI | bt@mediaprima.com.my - KUALA LUMPUR: Standard Chartered Saadiq Malaysia (Saadiq Malaysia) is confident that the local Islamic banking industry can achieve Bank Negara Malaysia's target of having a 40 per cent market share, in terms of total banking assets, by 2020. "I am quite confident that Islamic banking in Malaysia will be on equal footing with its conventional counterpart, in terms of total banking assets market share by 2020," said Saadiq Malaysia chief executive officer Wasim Saifi at the launch of Saadiq windows at Standard Chartered Bank Malaysia's (StanChart Malaysia) conventional branches, here, yesterday. "We now see that the industry is becoming increasingly bigger, more so in Malaysia where it has the full support of Bank Negara. "Despite the challenging global environment, we are optimistic of double-digit growth in this sector, backed by the regulatory framework that Bank Negara has put in place." In a bid to increase its Islamic banking presence here, Saadiq Malaysia will set up a Saadiq window at each of the 33 conventional Standard Chartered branches across the country. "We have 10 full-fledged Saadiq branches, but within two years, we will have Saadiq windows at all of our 33 conventional branches in order to further increase our presence," he said. The Saadiq window has already been introduced at eight branches in the Klang Valley, Seremban, Alor Star, Johor Baru, Butterworth, Kuching, Kuantan and Kota Kinabalu. Wasim said Saadiq Malaysia will focus more on the financing of its small and medium enterprise (SME) segment, as well as introducing new products for the affluent market. "We are looking to capitalise on our partnership with Credit Guarantee Corp Malaysia Bhd to provide financing to SMEs via our Islamic Portfolio Guarantee scheme. SMEs have always been a very important segment for us and we are definitely going to drive that segment further this year," he said. Saadiq Malaysia contributes some 13 per cent of business to StanChart Malaysia and 25 per cent to Standard Chartered Saadiq's (StanChart Saadiq) global operations. StanChart Saadiq will launch its Kenya operations next week, which marks its entry into Africa. Read more: 'Market share of Islamic bank assets can hit 40pc by 2020' - Nation - New Straits Times http://www.nst.com.my/business/nation/market-share-of-islamic-bank-assets-can-hit-40pc-by-2020-1.508200#ixzz2wNr95S2l