Bursa Malaysia Berhad (“Bursa Malaysia”) today announced that it was awarded the ‘Best Islamic Exchange 2015’ for the performance of its Bursa Suq Al-Sila’ (“BSAS”) platform, at the Global Islamic Finance Awards 2015 held on 28 September 2015 in Manama, Bahrain. The award was presented in recognition of the double-digit growth in trades on the platform since its inception in 2009.
From right to left: H.E. Simon Martin CMG, UK Ambassador to Bahrain presenting the “Best Islamic Exchange 2015” award to Mr. Jamaluddin Nor Mohamad, the Director of Islamic Capital Market of Bursa Malaysia accompanied by Mr. Shamsul Akmal Ahmad, Senior Vice President, BSAS Operations & Dealings of Islamic Capital Market of Bursa Malaysia, at the Global Islamic Finance Awards 2015 in Manama, Bahrain.
Dato’ Tajuddin Atan, the Chief Executive Officer of Bursa Malaysia said, “Bursa Malaysia is pleased to receive this recognition from the international financial community for the performance of our Bursa Suq Al-Sila’ global commodity murabahah trading platform.
The consistent double-digit growth since its inception in 2009 has been encouraging as we observe more interests coming from the MENA and Asia regions. As an Exchange, our focus remains to build on the greater depth and diversity to our marketplace, especially in Shariah-compliant products and services that would appeal to both the institutional and retail audience.”
The platform grew by 178% on an annualised basis from 2009 to 2014. In 2014 alone, BSAS trades recorded an increase of 77% with an average of RM6.9 billion daily transacted trades. BSAS recorded its largest trade value in a day of RM16.3 billion on 8 December 2014. The growth trend and trade levels is encouraging as it demonstrates a strong and growing acceptance of murabahah and the BSAS platform by financial institutions and sukuk issuers. It also reflects the opportunities in liquidity management and the deepening interest in Islamic finance globally.
As at 31 December 2014, BSAS has 73 registered local and 20 foreign participants. BSAS offers five (5) commodities – crude palm oil, plastic resin, RBD palm olein, hardwood timber and softwood timber and can be traded in 25 major currencies including USD, GBP, JPY, SAR, AED, KWD and MYR.