KUALA LUMPUR (July 17): RAM Rating Services Bhd is maintaining its forecast that the global sukuk issuance will come in between US$75 billion and US$85 billion in 2018, based on the growth trends in sukuk issued by several countries in the first six months of this year. 

These countries include Malaysia, Indonesia, Bahrain, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates. 

“Overall, the sukuk market’s showing in 2018 will depend on the performance of the global economy and the state of investment recovery in key Islamic finance countries,” RAM’s Islamic finance head Ruslena Ramli said in a statement today. 

According to the rating agency, Malaysia continues to lead in terms of the number of sukuk issuance and financing amount. 

It said total global sukuk issuance in the first half of 2018 slipped 5.2% to US$50.3 billion, from US$53 billion in the same period last year. 

This was largely due to declines in sukuk issuance from Qatar (-63.6%), Saudi Arabia (-37.9%), and Turkey (-18.0%),” it said. 

As for Malaysia, RAM said the country had increased its sukuk issuance by 4.3% to US$19.4 billion in the first half, from US$18.6 billion a year ago, translating into a healthy 38.7% market share of global sukuk issuance. 

At the same time, RAM said Indonesia charted a 52.6% jump to US$6.6 billion, from US$4.3 billion. By contrast, the Gulf Cooperation Countries (GCC) posted a contraction of 19.1% to US$21.3 billion, from US$26.3 billion. 

“Nevertheless, the GCC’s sovereign sukuk issues took up the lion’s share (67.6%) of its total sukuk issuance, reversing earlier market trends,” RAM said, adding that the percentage of sovereign sukuk issuance only averaged some 25% prior to 2017.