“Africa rising”: Sukuk appetite spreads

https://islamicmarkets.com/articles/%E2%80%9Cafrica-rising%E2%80%9D-sukuk-appetite-spreads
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A new frontier seems to be opening for the global sukuk market.

With conventional investors appetite for African bonds waning, governments in the region are looking at the Sukuk market to diversify their funding base and finance the big infrastructure projects.

South Africa recently announced plans to issue its first sukuk, aiming to become only the second non-Muslim country sukuk issuance after the United Kingdom. The move comes as governments are facing an increasingly challenging debt markets.

Once the US Federal Reserve announced that it would start tapering it’s quantitative easing programme in May 2013, it didn’t take long for the market jitters to spread to emerging economies. Bond prices dropped, with investors seeking greater yields and...