US: The Islamic finance industry is at a crossroads, where one path leads to standardizing its product offerings and the other toward developing the sector further before standardization, said Andrew Metcalf, a US-based partner at law firm King & Spalding’s Middle East and Islamic finance practice group.
Metcalf also advocated further innovation in the industry before a common standard is developed as he feels that it would hamper the sector’s long-term growth to stall at a time when the industry is capable of innovating a lot more.
The Islamic finance specialist also said that for derivatives, the Shariah compliant finance industry needs to make a stand on whether it should be considered gambling or serves an economic purpose.