By: Eman Ghaly

Mubasher: Assets of Islamic banks operating in Qatar rose 0.5% month-on-month to QAR 351.2 billion ($97 billion) in August, compared to QAR 349.3 billion ($96.8 billion) in July.

By the end of August, assets of the Qatari Islamic lenders represented 25.2% from total bank assets of QAR 1.393 trillion ($386 billion), according to Qatar Central Bank’s (QCB) recent data.

Five sharia-compliant banks are operating in the gas-rich nation, namely Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB), Qatar International Islamic Bank (QIIB), Masraf Al Rayan, Barwa Bank, and Qatar First Bank (QFB).

Deposits of Islamic banks amounted to QAR 212.3 billion by the end of August, representing 26.3% from that total of QAR 807.3 billion.

While reserves of the GCC country’s Islamic banks comprised of QAR 12.9billion balances in the central bank, and QAR 1.9 billion liquidity.

Islamic banks’ lending reached QAR 221.1 billion, equals 62.9% of the total.

It is worth noting that Barwa Bank and QIIB have signed their merger deal by the end of August, creating a sharia-compliant lender with QAR 80 billion in assets, making up 22.9% of total assets of Qatar's Islamic banks.

Translated by: Kholoud Mohamed Hussein