Although the performance pales in comparison to the country’s 69 per cent of share of global sukuk as at end-2014, RAM said the ringgit remained the currency of choice for sukuk issuance, followed by the US dollar and the Indonesian rupiah.
KUCHING: Malaysia retained its leading position as a sukuk hub last year, accounting for 53 per cent of global issuance at the end of the year.
“This is a strong finish for Malaysia, which has had to contend with the devaluation of the ringgit, slower sukuk issuance and new issuers from other countries,” noted Ruslena Ramli, RAM Ratings’ Head of Islamic Finance in a statement yesterday.
Although the performance pales in comparison to the country’s 69 per cent of share of global sukuk as at end-2014, RAM said the ringgit remained the currency of choice for sukuk issuance, followed by the US dollar and the Indonesian rupiah.
The corporate sector underscored resilience of global sukuk issuance, including quasi-government issuers.
On the domestic front, the value of outstanding sukuk had increased m-o-m to RM608.5 billion as at end-2015, accounting for 54 per cent of the market’s outstanding debt securities.
RAM Ratings’ latest edition of the Sukuk Snapshot also shows that sukuk constituted 45 per cent of the RM254.2 billion of domestically issued debt securities in 2015.
The ratings agency observed that there was a noticable increase in sukuk issuance from new markets.
Oman and the Ivory Coast, for example, have joined the growing list of sovereign sukuk issuers.
“New markets are envisaged to come on board in 2016, given the strong interest in sukuk financing, with a number of potential sovereign ussies from the African sub-continent.”