Islamic Finance: Morocco is planning to issue its first sukuk

Morocco declares that it is going to launch its sukuk, in partnership with specialized banks of the field, more than one year after Bank Al-Maghrib granted licenses to five local banks to set up their Islamic finance subsidiaries, reported Bloomberg.

Hicham Talby, who heads the Financial sector department at the Ministry of Finance, indicates that the financial instruments will be operational this year, including Ijara, Wakala, Musharaka and Murabaha.

By harmonizing the traditional capital markets bonds system and the Shariah-compliant systems, the sukuk links the yields to assets and therefore interests do not apply.

"The government is conscious that we must develop and complete as soon as possible the operational, legal and regulatory aspects of Islamic finance", said Talby, according to Bloomberg.

While Morocco's first debt issue may take some time to be implemented, Hicham Talbt is expecting the process to be much faster for the next three planned sukuk issues. "We adopted a strategy of market development", he concluded.

For the record, the global sukuk sales registered a high record of $ 55.7 billion in 2017.