Forus, a Saudi based financial technology platform for financial services, has assigned Shariyah Review Bureau to supervise its Shari’a compliance affairs related to its debt crowd-funding activity.

 Forus is a P2P lending marketplace that bridges the gap in SME financing. Through its platform it enables investors to invest in a marketplace of alternative loans targeted towards small and medium businesses.

Nosaibah Alrajhi, Chief Executive Officer of Forus said: “Access to finance is one of the biggest obstacles facing the development of SMEs. Platform like Forus are able to conveniently provide financing, bridging the corporate's working capital needs and the investors who are looking for diversification.”

“At Forus we have successfully augmented technological capabilities by developing faster ways of connecting financier with SME’s whilst complying with the requirements and obligations stipulated under the regulations of Saudi Central Bank and SAMA" he added.

 "The platform mechanics is fairly straight-forward bringing investors and SME's together. We do all the due diligence, and once companies meet our benchmarks, they're listed on the platform, giving investors — individual and institutional — the opportunity to lend them money,” said Alrajhi.

“Bringing Shariyah Review Bureau on board to supervise our Sharia compliance affairs will further strengthen trust in our stakeholders and end-users. We are bound to benefit from their decade of experiences with traditional institutes and providing Sharia assurance to our stakeholders,” he added.

Over the years, Shariyah Review Bureau has strongly established itself as one of the leading Sharia Advisory firm in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It currently caters to 52% of the cooperative Insurance firms, 37% of the financing activities and 32% of the investment firms listed on Tadawul exchange. In addition to traditional financial institutions, SRB  has been providing Shari'a board, certification and Audit services to numerous Fintechs with diverse consumer offering.

 “The financial sector in the region is not immune to digital-disruption. We have been helping fintech companies combine the latest digital-delivered financial solutions with Islamic Finance” said Yasser S. Dahlawi, Founder and CEO of SRB.

“Our team looks forward to working with Forus to ensure all of the platform's processes comply with Shari’a guidelines, tightening transactional controls eliminating any possibility of non-compliance. We seek to deliver high-valued service, offering Forus's stake-holders the Shari'a assurance it needs to ensure Shari’a compliant transactions." – TradeArabia News Service