Australian Islamic wealth manager Crescent Wealth has inked a partnership deal with Bank of London and The Middle East (BLME), the largest Islamic bank in Europe, to help Australian retail investors gain access to the booming Islamic bonds market for the first time.

Following the partnership, investors in theCrescent Islamic Cash Management Fund will be able to gain exposure to the over $150 billion global market for Sharia’a-compliant bonds (sukuks).

The portfolio will be managed by BLME, a leading global provider of Sharia’a-compliant fixed income product, whose main shareholders are Boubyan Bank and the Kuwaiti Public Institution for Social Security.

Crescent Wealth founder and managing director, Talal Yassine, said: "Our partnership with BLME is significant because it is further evidence that Australia is being taken seriously as a viable growth market for Islamic funds management."

“The partnership rounds out Crescent Wealth’s sharia’a-compliant product suite by adding a fixed income option to our existing Australian and global equities, property and cash offering. It also brings exposure to the GCC market, and gives our investors added confidence that our fixedincome option is being managed by the best in the industry,” he added.

Nigel Denison, the head of Wealth Management at BLME, said: “Recently we have seen increased demand from international investors for sukuk because of good credit performance that has proven it to be resilient to the global economic downturn."

"The strong performance of our fixed income products has been supported by a buoyant sukuk market with 2012 looking to be a record year both in terms of our product performance and for the Sukuk market overall," he added.

Islamic banking is one of the fastest growing financial sectors today. The global Islamic banking assets exceed $1 trillion and are forecast to grow to $2 trillion by 2017 (as per HSBC Amanah Global Sukuk Market: Current Status and Growth Potential 18 May 2012).

In addition, there is an estimated $58 billion in managed funds invested in Sharia’a compliant equities.The sukuk has exceeded pre-financial crisis levels and is expected to grow expotentially over the coming years.-TradeArabia News Service