Mashreq Al Islami, the Islamic arm of Mashreq bank, aims to capture five per cent of the UAE market in three years as sharia-compliant products get top priority, the company's chief executive said.

Mashreq Al Islami, formerly known as Badr al Islami, has about a three per cent market share now, Moinuddin Malim told Reuters in an interview.

He said the company also aspires to count for 20 per cent of the balance sheet of its parent, UAE-based Mashreq Group, in three years.

'Over the last few years, we have successfully demonstrated to the shareholders of the bank that the Islamic finance model is very viable,' Malim said.

He added that Mashreq is actively marketing and distributing the Islamic finance products to customers, ahead of it's own conventional offerings.

'We are selling Islamic first,' he said, adding that the company was laying down the foundation to grow its Islamic bank by providing its front-office employees in all of its branches with sharia training and certification.

Malim said Mashreq Bank was not currently considering converting into a fully Islamic bank but if there was significant market demand for Islamic financial products, full conversion was not out of the question.

'We're not averse to that but there are possibilities that whenever the UAE central bank starts giving banking licences to finance companies, we may convert,' he said.

'We don't need to convert the whole bank into Islamic. Both can co-exist side by side.'

Mashreq al Islami may consider acquisitions down the road to grow but is currently focused on increasing its sharia-compliant product offerings, Malim said.

The company is looking at offering a sharia-compliant overdraft product by the end of the second quarter,  and offering fixed income products to provide overnight liquidity.

'Our intent is to look at these conventional structures and build an Islamic product around them,' he said. 'Those products need to be there for the client and we would like to be at the forefront of Islamic product innovation for our clients.'-Reuters