Tag Archives: Rosana Gulzar Mohd

“Gotong Royong” Bank?

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To the uninitiated, the term “gotong-royong” means cooperation in Bahasa Malaysia. It is a concept where the community may come together to assist its community members without expectation of returns. In Malaysia, this is a community event to achieve a certain purpose for example a village wedding.

But how about having a “gotong-royong” Bank? Ms Rozana Gulzar, who contributed an earlier article on this site, made this interesting proposition that while the current Islamic Finance system set-up based on the conventional banking model is working sufficiently, a different model of banking may provide a closer structure espoused under the Maqasid of Shariah (Objectives of Shariah). A more inclusive and less profit driven model? It may provide a refreshing alternative to the existing financial system. Maybe not as a full 100% replacement of the existing models (where it caters for a large scope of requirements) but to complement and complete the Islamic Banking financial infrastructure.

Read about what she wrote below, as well as her earlier writings on this site.

DOWNLOAD : Cooperative Banking as the Solution for Islamic Banking Woes (pdf)

Excerpt from Rosana’s being cooperative:

While there are some differences in the models of cooperative banks in various regions of the world, a basic common feature is that they are owned by members, who in turn tend to be their depositors and borrowers. That’s mutuality built right into the system. This form of ownership then sets the tone for a business model that is more Islamic than ‘Islamic’ commercial banks. For example, because cooperative banks are owned by members who may be their borrowers, profit maximisation is not the main objective. Their raison d’être is in fact to charge reasonable enough rates so that those who cannot get financing from blood-sucking commercial banks can do so through the cooperative banks. And yes, they are not Islamic in form but I think they are more Islamic in spirit.

Bankers of cooperative banks are also known to have close relationships with their customers. A Turkish German once told me that his neighbourhood banker would come regularly for tea. When he notices a child in the household is old enough for a bank account of his own, the banker will ask the parents if he should indeed open one for him. Germany by the way is home to the largest network of cooperative and savings banks in the world. This close relationship has important implications. One it answers a call by some quarters for a move towards relationship-based banking as opposed to the transactions-based frenzy that characterises commercial banking and has been blamed for the crises. Secondly, it addresses a key issue that has been plaguing Islamic finance since its modern birth: How to implement profit and loss sharing (PLS) contracts such as musharakah and mudarabah which are at the heart of an ideal Islamic financial system when early attempts failed due to moral hazard and adverse selection issues.

Additionally, she makes a call to academia to rise to the occasion of re-looking the existing model and having more research to support the building of the new model. She throws the challenge that the road is still long and hard and only the ones who are able to persevere will make a difference.

DOWNLOAD : Islamic Finance Academia – We Can Do Better (pdf)

Excerpt from Rosana’s war cry to Academia:

Firstly, we need to address the controversies. Islamic finance is suffering from a dichotomy between theory and practice. What is taught in schools is a world away from what is being practiced. While ‘Islamic’ bankers keep an almost sole focus on producing the best ROE for shareholders, at the obvious expense of social welfare, Islamic finance professors go on and on about the ideals that shape this form of finance, oblivious to the divergence in practice. It is thus not surprising that the ‘solutions’ they come up with have no semblance to reality. I keep thinking, ‘We are not yet in jannah so how will this work in the real world?’

To come up with better solutions, I think we need to first face facts. Don’t gloss over them. I would prefer an honest (and mature) discussion of how we have gone wrong in Islamic finance and how to address them. This obviously needs rigor in thought and analysis. And critical thinking. Just because someone is from the IMF or World Bank does not mean he knows what he is saying or his intentions are purer than pure. We still need to evaluate the rigor of his arguments. On the other end, those who do not understand Islamic finance need to keep silent. The problem in Islamic finance is that we have many talking heads who really sound like empty vessels. And you know what they say about empty vessels right? (They make the most noise).

I like to make the same challenge to my staff as well; 90% of the practices we see today are derived from decisions, opinion and fatwa made in mid 1990s and has been taken as Urf (custom) and not challenged anymore… but we should re-look at some of them (especially with standing controversies) and see if current regulations and Shariah Advisory Council resolutions and product thinking and market development can offer a better solution. Doesn’t Islamic Banking allow for intelligent discussion to always evolve into something better? Just because it has now become Urf, it does not mean there is no better solution and be happy with the status quo. There’s always room for improvements to this 30 year old industry.

The purpose of this website is to encourage constructive discussions and perhaps find a better solution to the existing ones. Let’s have your views on these topics. Have a read of Rosana’s writing and I know she appreciates honest feedback on her work. Do spend that time reading, and your comments may perhaps resonate in someone’s mind and change the world.

To go to Rosana’s page, click here.

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Is Islamic Finance Suffering from the Wrong Model of Implementation?

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One of the things that attract me to maintain this website on Islamic Banking is the opportunity to interact and share ideas with the various practitioners and academicians in the industry. There are many discussion topics and we intend to bring such discussions to the open table as constructive as possible. Interaction with Ms Rosana is always interesting as she dare explore the Islamic Banking model itself, making comparison to other similar models in the market across geographies. And I do share some of her views on the industry, and I have written about it to some extend in my earlier postings. What is interesting about Ms Rosana is that she is taking the discussion a necessary step further in evaluating the existing Banking model, as to whether it is the right model to begin with. She has written a short discourse on this topic and looking to explore in-depth its implication in the near future.

She welcomes constructive feedback, comment and discussion points for this posting and hopes to decide on the next step forward gauging from your kind response. Do read and give us your opinion and comments. Thank you.

Is Islamic Finance Suffering from the Wrong Model of Implementation?

By Rosana Gulzar Mohd

In this blog’s latest post ‘Disruption: Islamic contracts’, there holds an imminent danger. The Islamic banks in Malaysia are not so much inching towards becoming just like the interest-based conventional banks they were supposed to replace but in fact, running towards them. Even as the industry celebrates its trillion size assets and formerly astronomical growth, there lies a darker truth. In a recent class I taught on the dichotomy between Islamic banking theory and practice, a participant, a new ‘Islamic’ banker, came up to me and wanted to discuss commodity murabaha. She said her team had just tabled the product for the bank’s approval but she did not feel comfortable. The head of the Shariah committee also seemed disappointed. His comment, according to her, was that we no longer need Shariah advisers. The industry only needs commodity murabaha experts now.

Post-IFSA 2013 which fines and jails CEOs and everyone above and below for any wrongdoing and a flurry of policy documents telling banks how to implement Shariah contracts, ‘Islamic’ banks in Malaysia are seeking refuge in tawarruq. Musharakah and mudarabah? All that is left of profit and loss sharing contracts, which some scholars say are at the heart of the ideal Islamic financial system, is the policy documents by Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM). I would be pleasantly surprised if anyone can show me a bank which is genuinely implementing them. The supposed mudarabah-based products brought on by IFSA, namely the investment accounts and the IA platform, are currently being mutilated to look almost like any guaranteed and fixed return deposit. The IAP, I believe, are unlikely to be successful for laughable reasons.

When commercial banking, with its inherent tendencies for excesses, profit maximisation and desensitisation to social welfare, is the problem, how does crowdfunding through commercial banks become the solution? Won’t the banks still look for credit-worthy companies with an almost guaranteed future to fund? Who then takes care of the small and medium-sized entrepreneurs who are also seeking financing? Are not the SMEs the backbones of the economy? Not to mention, where is the upholding of Islamic values such as justice, equitability and social well-being? Granted there are other organisations in Malaysia meant to help the lower incomes and SMEs but why do ‘Islamic’ banks call themselves ‘Islamic’ if they are far from embodying the ideal values in Shariah? Unfortunately, this sad state of affairs extends to other parts of Islamic finance such as takaful (apparently ‘Islamic’ insurance), sukuk, the other beauty pageant contestant in this parade, and other capital market products such as interest rate, oh wait, ‘profit’ rate swaps.

How did BNM envision the success of IFSA with no changes to the current environment? We are still in a dual system where ‘Islamic’ banks are pitted head-to-head against interest-based conventional banks. ‘Islamic’ assets are still only a quarter of the entire system despite the country allowing all sorts of controversial contracts such as bai al dayn, bai al inah and the one that takes the cake, tawarruq. Where are the educational campaigns to explain to customers this shift in the industry that the central bank expects to happen?

When customers, including ‘Muslims’, have been accustomed to deposit guarantees and fixed returns their whole lives, how do banks suddenly sell them an ‘investment account’ that promises neither? Is it any surprise that conventional bankers are using this as a selling point? They are telling customers to avoid ‘Islamic’ products because there are no guarantees. Theirs still do. When the chiefs of ‘Islamic’ banks themselves seem cloudy in their understanding of the new regulations, how did BNM envision people on the street, who are banking with its ‘Islamic’ banks, to embrace the changes? A deputy director unfortunately got defensive when I asked. Other central bankers claimed ignorance because they “are not from that department”.

While BNM seems keen to reform the industry, perhaps the answer it has been looking for is that the Islamic finance industry, and within it, Islamic banking, has been built the wrong way. Trying to make it work in the commercial banking space is what has led to the frequent comment that it is like squeezing a square peg into a round hole. Commercial banking, with its profit maximisation mantra and desensitisation to social welfare, is antithetical to the Shariah ideals of justice, equitability and social well-being as embodied in the maqasid. And isn’t it the one that has been leading the world from one crisis to another? Why then are we so busy emulating them? Isn’t it time the powers that be wake up and face facts?

So why did all the big organisations in Islamic finance, from the global standard-setters such as AAOIFI and IFSB to each country’s central banks and each ‘Islamic’ banks’ Shariah committees condone these practices? Perhaps because they were the easiest thing to do and allows for a fast build if the intention is to grab fame and fortune through one’s achievements in Islamic finance. The countless Islamic finance awards and conferences and the effusive back slapping there are testaments to this. Bankers are such happy people.

So what is the solution? I believe it is cooperative banking. The true, genuine type practiced in Europe and not the ones in Muslim countries because they are largely used to fund political cronies and thus suffer from questionable management and corruption. My next article will thus explain cooperative banking, how the model works and why they are a better fit for Islamic finance than the current commercial banking model. In the meantime, I look forward to your thoughts. Students of Islamic finance intuitively get it when I explain these arguments while some practitioners acquiesce (quietly agree). Another group reminds me of this statement in a book by Upton Sinclair, who ironically was also an investigative journalist (uncovers scandals and corruption) as I was in my former life and whose solution to the 1930s Depression in California is to create cooperative ventures for the unemployed. The idea, to his surprise, received wide support but his bid to run as governor was waylaid, according to him, by the oppositions’ “dirty tricks”. He wrote this statement in his book about the political adventure, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” The reaction of the other group of bankers brings to mind this quote.

What do you think about her assessment and commentary on the Islamic Banking model? Do give us your feedback in the comment box. Thank you.

Check out her other contributions in the following page : Writings Rozana Gulzar Mohd 

German Banks: More Islamic than Islamic Banks?

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In one of my engagements a couple of years ago,  I had the fortune to present my views on the Islamic Banking industry and its challenges in front of an audience in INCEIF. One of the bright participants there had subsequently proceeded to complete her MSc Research and recently gotten in touch with me. I had a read of what she had published, and it is a remarkable piece of academia. I have since asked for her permission to publish it on this site, for the benefits of other readers. Good food for thought.

Thank you Ms Rosana Gulzar Mohd, for your allowance to this request.

Overall, I find the research quite enlightening and overall accurate. It is also a good reminder of what we still need to achieve to ensure Islamic Banking remains focused and strong for the foreseeable future. Happy reading and do give your constructive feedback on the paper for our discussion.
Note : Ms Rosana was a student from INCEIF : The Global University of Islamic Finance and recently finished her MSc thesis concluding that a) Islamic banks are not really ‘Islamic’ and b) the recommendations for reforms. The analysis centres on the industry in Malaysia. She is keen to pursue her PhD. (Click this link for alternate site to download research)
Middle East Institute – National University of Singapore
Abstract:
This study, which compares the German system with Malaysia in the hope of improving Islamic finance, uncovers four paradoxes. Germany is chosen because its focus on mutuality and small enterprises, at the expense of profit maximisation, not only embodies the Shariah principles of justice and social welfare but also makes the system more stable. The banks’ profitability and stability between 2006 and 2014 are compared. This covers their performances before, during and after the global financial crisis. The indicators used are the banks’ return on average equity (ROAE), return on average asset (ROAA) and net loan to deposits and short-term funding. While this study finds that Malaysian banks, including Islamic ones, are indeed significantly more profitable and efficient than German banks, it uncovers four paradoxes. Firstly, it is ironical that Malaysian commercial banks are less aggressive than the Germans in their loans-to-deposit ratio. Secondly, the profitability of Malaysian development financial institutions (DFIs) and banking cooperatives are comparable, if not higher, than its commercial banks. Thirdly, the ROAE for Malaysian banking cooperatives rose 41% during the 2008 crisis when other banks’ fell. The last paradox is that while Malaysian commercial banks seem prudent in their lending, the DFIs and banking cooperatives are leveraged to an alarming extent. This study concludes with two reform recommendations: a rethink of the economic drivers in Malaysia and a sprucing up of the DFIs and cooperatives’ balance sheets towards national standards.