National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) has announced the launch of “Thahabi Ijara Fund VI”, an Islamic Sharia-compliant investment fund in dollars.

The bank said the Islamic leasing fund has been designed specifically to meet the needs of its Thahabi customers for low risk investments that generate a consistent monthly income and which satisfy the requirements of Sharia board.

Thahabi is the premier package from NBK that offers customers personalized and ‘best in class’ products and services, delivered by professional Personal Banking Officers. This includes many banking related discounts, fee waivers and value-added lifestyle benefits, said a senior official.

Qualification for Thahabi package is subject to meeting the minimum deposit criteria of KD30,000 ($102,392) in any interest or non-interest bearing account, or a minimum continuous monthly salary transfer of KD1,500.

NBK assistant general manager, Consumer Banking Group, Adel Al Jenaee, said: “The introduction of Thahabi Ijara Fund VI is a result of the great success and demand for our Ijara Fund series, which are proof of our commitment to bring to market high quality, low risk funds.”

The concept of Ijara - Islamic leasing, along with Islamic Murabaha, has proved to be one of the fastest growing activities of Islamic financial institutions worldwide, and the Ijara funds launched by NBK have been some of the bank’s most successful investment products.

Al Jenaee said that the fund seeks to invest all of its assets in the purchase of equipment or purchase portfolios of equipment, and lease this equipment to a variety of tenants.

The Fund will invest in high quality leases that deal mainly with the largest 1,000 companies in the US and companies with high credit quality. The equipment portfolios of the Fund in terms of type and tenants are diversified, thus reducing the risk rate.

The entire portfolio is invested according to Islamic Sharia principles and under the supervision of the Shariah board, Al Jenaee said.

"The subscription of the Fund, limited to Thahabi customers, lasts for only four weeks. It is possible to close the subscription period before the end of term in depending on the demand, he added.-TradeArabia News Service