MANAMA: Bahrain's main opposition newspaper resumed publication on Monday after its high-profile editor was replaced by a low-key columnist and board member.
Bahrain suspended the Al Wasat newspaper on Sunday, accusing it of falsifying news about (...)
MANAMA: Small protests broke out in Bahrain's capital for a planned "Day of Rage" on Friday despite a ban under martial law imposed last week, but were quickly crushed by security forces fanned out across Manama.
Helicopters buzzing overhead, (...)
MANAMA: Bahrain has freed 23 people accused of trying to topple the island's Sunni Muslim monarchy, along with other prisoners and people detained in last week's protests, a Shia opposition lawmaker said on Wednesday.
The prisoner release was a (...)
MANAMA- Bahrain's main Shi'ite opposition bloc has rejected a royal call for dialogue to end unrest that has cost the lives of six anti-government protesters, a Shi'ite ex-lawmaker said on Saturday.
"Nobody is willing to sit with officials if the (...)
Bankers hoping to introduce the wider use of derivatives in Islamic finance said on Monday they would develop simpler individual contracts to try and foster the wider use of such instruments.
Islamic finance industry body IIFM and several (...)
MANAMA: Bankers in Islamic finance are increasingly outsourcing sharia supervision due to a lack of scholars in the industry, but critics say this is making the sector even less transparent and slowing its development.
The $1 trillion industry (...)
MANAMA/KUALA LUMPUR: Arshad Khan, the chief of the Bahrain Financial Exchange, had envisaged a global Islamic trading platform when he set out to work with Malaysia's stock exchange this year.
Though the talks fell through, Khan thinks there may (...)
MANAMA: The outlook for Bahrain's banking system remains negative as more losses loom mainly due to exposure to local and regional real estate, rating agency Moody's said on Thursday.
The agency said in a statement it expected non-performing (...)
MANAMA: Investcorp, the Bahrain-based asset manager that once floated luxury brands Gucci and Tiffany posted a return to profit for the second half on Wednesday buoyed by its hedge fund business.
It posted a full-year net profit of $102.2 (...)
MANAMA: Kuwait's International Investment Group (IIG) the investment house in the midst of a restructuring process, on Wednesday said its board is proposing not to pay out any dividend for 2009.
IIG is one of the Kuwaiti investment houses badly (...)
MANAMA: Bahraini retail lender BBK will not launch its planned benchmark bond issue until market conditions stabilize, its chief executive said on Monday.
The bank held investors meetings in May with a view to a potential benchmark US dollar (...)
MANAMA: Bahrain does not plan to sell shares in the Bahrain Stock Exchange that is currently being converted into a commercial company, the country's central bank governor said in remarks published on Thursday.
Rasheed Al-Maraj was cited in the (...)
MANAMA: Bahrain's property market is likely to remain subdued for some time due to lack of financing, while oversupply in both the residential and commercial sector will put further pressure on rents, a report said on Monday.
Some 19,300 new (...)
MANAMA: Bahrain needs to reinvent itself as a financial centre if it wants to return to growth and remain a destination for the region's oil wealth after the financial crisis clipped the wings of its investment houses.
Analysts say the only (...)
MANAMA: Bahrain's Islamic investment house Arcapita posted on Friday a more than doubling of its third quarter losses on a slump in income and foreign exchange losses.
The investment firm said in an advertisement published in the Bahrain Tribune (...)
DUBAI: Gulf Finance House will sell its 50 percent stake in Bahrain Financial Harbor Holding to Emar Bahrain, the company said in a statement on Monday.
The sale, which is part of the cash-strapped firm's strategy of divesting non-core assets, (...)
MANAMA: The number of Islamic fund liquidations is expected to rise unless the nascent industry can develop the scale needed to tap into a large enough pool of Muslim wealth to succeed, a director at Ernst & Young said.
Assets managed by Islamic (...)
MANAMA: Bahraini investment house Arcapita on Sunday signed a new $200 million loan, signaling that debt markets are opening up to the troubled sector, and said it expected a sizable loss for this year.
Bahrain's investment houses have been badly (...)
MANAMA: Bahrain has suspended local operations of Qatari broadcaster Al Jazeera and barred a crew from traveling to the Gulf Arab state, accusing the channel of flouting press rules.
Al Jazeera, with a record of tense relations with Arab states (...)
MANAMA: Bahrain's Gulf Finance House is considering increasing its stake in Khaleeji Commercial Bank instead of selling it under its asset sales program, its chief executive said on Tuesday.
Like other Bahraini investment houses, GFH has been (...)
MANAMA/DUBAI: More banks in the Gulf Arab region may convert to Islamic finance in a bid to tap rising demand for sharia-compliant products and to avoid the heavy investment required to launch new banks. A source told Reuters this month that Qatari (...)
KUALA LUMPUR/MANAMA: The global financial crisis has intensified a push for Islamic finance to return to its roots and move further away from conventional banking, but some warn that more originality could alienate investors.
Many bankers fear (...)
MANAMA/KUALA LUMPUR: Bahrain-based Islamic lender Al Baraka is in talks to buy a stake in Malaysia s Bank Muamalat, its chief executive said, with a source adding it could buy up to 49 percent in the lender.
Nothing has been signed, there are (...)
MANAMA: The World Bank plans to support standard-setting bodies of the Islamic finance industry in turning their voluntary standards into binding banking regulations, a bank official said.
The fledgling Islamic finance industry is governed by a (...)
MANAMA: The securitization of mortgages will be the next catalyst of growth for Islamic finance once financial markets have calmed down, an executive said on Monday.
The Islamic finance industry is striving to develop more banking products to (...)