This study constructs active Islamic portfolios using a multi-style rotation strategy, derived from the three prominent styles, namely, momentum, value, and quality investing. We use the stocks that are consistently listed in the U.S. Dow Jones Islamic index for a sample period from 1996 to 2012. We also include two macroeconomic mimicking portfolios to capture the premiums of industrial production growth and inflation innovation, accommodating the economic regime shifts. Based on the information coefficients, we find the six-month momentum and the fractal measure as momentum factors; the enterprise yield (gross profit/TEV) and the book to market ratio as valuation factors; the gross profit to total assets, the return on capital, and the scaled total accruals as quality factors. We further construct active portfolios using the augmented Black Litterman (ABL) factor model to avoid the factor alignment problem, with the factor views predicted using Markov Switching VAR, MIDAS, and Bayesian Model Averaging. The out-of-sample performance of our portfolios can produce information ratios of 0.7–0.8 over the composite indices, and information ratios of 0.42–0.48 over the style indices, with the annualized alphas of 10–11%. Even when we put the constrained tracking error of 1% over the benchmark, our portfolios still produce information ratios of 0.9–1.2 before transaction costs, and 0.6–0.8 after transaction costs. We provide intuitive explanations for each premium changing over time, and suggest the promising strategy for Islamic equity investors to outperform the market.

Economists typically divide the overall macro economy into two sectors, the real sector and financial sector. The real sector represents the productive capacity of the economy and produces the goods and services that accounts for a nation's GDP (Gross Domestic Product). The financial sector on the other hand serves to provide the financing needed by the real sector to produce the goods and services. Islamic economics requires that all financial returns be anchored in real sector returns. For an economy to function optimally, both the real and financial sectors need to function optimally.

Efficiency of financial institution has become an important part of insurance literature. This study aims to evaluate the performance in term of cost efficiency for takaful and insurance firms in Malaysia. A sample of 18 firms consisting of 7 takaful operators and 11 conventional insurers are chosen from the period 2004 to 2009. The cost efficiency score for each firm are obtained using input oriented DEA model. A Kruskal Wallis and Mann Whitney test are employed to examine any significant difference in cost efficiency between Takaful industry and insurance industry. The main findings indicate a significant difference in cost efficiency between takaful and insurance industries. The average cost efficiency for takaful industry is 49.20% which implies they could reduce the cost of production by 50% without affecting the level of output. A lower market share exist in takaful industry has resulted to cost inefficiency. Essentially, this study has supported the market power theory.

Despite the huge potential on both the demand and supply sides of the sukuk market, the current sukukstructures fall short of adequately meeting the market’s needs as the Shari'ah compliance of many of them and/or their economic efficiency are questionable. Even though partnership-based sukuk are claimed to reflect the true spirit of Islamic finance, their underuse as a financing instrument is a notable fact. Such a situation, if not addressed, will impede the development of the sukuk market in the future. This paper proposes an innovative sukuk musharakah model for consideration by companies and revenue generating infrastructure projects. The model has an incentive-compatible feature by making the share of the issuing entity in the profit positively related to its performance in addition to a convertibility clause. The sector Return on Equity (ROE), adjusted with the firm beta, is considered a benchmark for measuring the performance of the firm. The paper examines the design of the model, its risk return profile as well as its pricing for secondary market trading.

The role of regulation extends beyond ensuring stability and confidence in the financial system, as it is also behavioral shaper of market players. The laws, standards, and guidelines issued are instrumental in creating an incentive structure for market players to behave in certain ways. Using incentive audit approach, this paper attempts to examine the efficacy of the evolving Malaysian regulatory and supervisory framework for Islamic banking, in preserving financial stability as well as supporting the growth of the financial system and real economy. The findings suggest that the present framework unintentionally misaligns incentives and discourages Islamic banks from fully embracing risk sharing as the underlying principle for their financial instruments.

This article undertakes an empirical examination of pure rights issues in Malaysia. Though pricing efficiency is the main focus, we also examine related issues. We study a total of 38 pure rights issues that occurred over the 8-year period January 1998 to December 2005. Using two alternative valuation models, the adjusted Black–Scholes Call Option Model (BSOPM) and the traditional Implied Rights Valuation Model (IRVM), we find the Malaysian market to be inefficient in pricing the rights. Mispricing is quite extensive with a predominance of overpricing. Significantly, both pricing models, despite their different theoretical underpinnings produce similar results. These results are further validated by the returns to our two arbitrage strategies. The trading strategy, which establishes a net short position in the rights produces substantial positive returns, whereas the strategy which effectively goes long the rights, produced marginally negative returns. We found underlying stock price volatility, liquidity and moneyness of the rights to be the key determinants of the extent of mispricing. Finally, we find that underlying stock price volatility was significantly lower post rights issue.

What a month March had been. Over a three-week period, four mid-size US banks had to be rescued and one large Swiss bank had to be folded into another. Meanwhile, a German bank had to suffer serious erosion of its equity value. It started with Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) needing to be rescued following a run by its depositors, on news of its loss of some US$2 billion (RM8.8 billion) from the sale of US government bonds it had been holding. It appears that SVB was holding a huge portfolio of long-dated government bonds - a clear case of a serious duration mismatch. Surprisingly, no one, not even the banking regulators, seemed to have been watching interest rate risks, even as the US Federal Reserve had been raising rates rapidly. Rising rates affect the value of items on a bank's balance sheet. Both assets and liabilities are affected, with the impact being determined by the duration of each item. Given the intermediation function of banks, the duration of assets is invariably longer than that of liabilities, a large part of which would be deposits. Thus, a bank holding large amounts of long-dated bonds would have a disproportionately large asset side duration and. accordingly, a large duration gap, making it highly susceptible to even small interest rate rises.

The impact of leverage on financial market stability and the relationship with the real economy is a key concern among researchers. This paper makes an initial attempt to investigate the relationship between a firm's leverage, return and share price volatility from an Islamic finance perspective and capital structure theory. A multicountry dynamic panel framework and the mean-variance efficient frontier are applied to 320 sample firms from eight European countries, divided into portfolios of low and high debt using the shari'ah screening threshold of 33%. We find that the firm's return and volatility change with changes in the capital structure. Islamic compliant stocks show, in most cases, less volatility than non-compliant stocks but are no different in terms of return. Finally, our results tend to imply a case for limiting debt beyond certain levels.

The risk sharing principles of Islamic finance as embodied in mudarabah and musharakah contracts have been extensively used throughout history. For example, the maritime trades of 14th century Italian city-states with Middle East and Asia were financed by ‘sea loans' and ‘commenda’. Historians have traced the development of commenda to borrowing from the concept of mudarabah used by Muslims (Udovitch, 1962; 1967; 1970; Mirakhor, 2003). They have also recorded how crucially important these contracts were to the growth of not only the maritime trade but also to the economic, social and political progress of European city-states.

The issue of liquidity and underdevelopment of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) stock markets has caused problems to companies in those countries that seek higher equity capital. One way out of this problem is to employ international markets more intensively by seeking cheaper cost of capital through Depositary Receipts (DRs). Many studies on DRs focused on emerging and developed countries, leaving many OIC countries behind. Thus, this study investigates the financial implication by examining the integration of returns of local and foreign stock markets via American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) and Global Depositary Receipts (GDRs) of OIC countries. Techniques employed in this study are cointegration and the speed of adjustments to examine the existence of integration between the local and foreign stock markets. The study covers a sample of 146 firms from 17 OIC countries that are cross-listed as ADRs or GDRs from 1992 to 2011. The findings show mixed results when some markets provide evidence of integration while others show evidence of segmentation. The study on the integration between DR and home equity markets has practical implications for both the international as well as domestic investors especially on portfolio selection, asset pricing and risk management

Muslim developing countries like many of their conventional counterparts suffer serious indebtedness. Amongst the 57 OIC countries, only the six Gulf cooperation Council countries have positive fiscal balances. The other 51 OIC nations have government budget deficits. Nineteen of these 51 countries are classified by the World Bank/IMF as HIPC (heavily indebted poor country). That government expenditure exceeds government revenues is a fairly common characteristic of developing economics. It is typically the result of the need to fund development. As matters now stand, there are two key problems with this. First, the budget shortfall is typically met by way of interest-based borrowing. Second, as domestic capital accumulation is usually insufficient, governments have to resort to borrowing in foreign currency.