KARACHI: Islamic banking has been growing fast to capture 20 per cent share in the overall banking industry by 2020 while its cumulative average growth rate of deposits is over 50pc.

Presently, five full-fledged Islamic banks, one Islamic banking subsidiary and 17 conventional banks with dedicated Islamic banking windows are operating with over 1,700 branches spread all over the country.

Several major initiatives pertaining to promotion of Islamic banking have been taken by the Steering Committee constituted in December 2013 which included establishment of separate Islamic Finance Department at SECP to promote Islamic capital market developments.

“The share of Islamic banking in total deposits of the banking industry has surged to 12.8pc as of June 30, 2015 and is consistently growing with a cumulative average growth rate of over 50pc during the past 12 years,” said the State Bank in a review over the development of Islamic banking.

Published in Dawn, November 5th, 2015

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