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SYDNEY/ Reuters
The African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) has raised around $260 million via three sharia-compliant facilities to support small- and medium-sized businesses in the region, as African markets gradually open to Islamic finance. Cairo-based Afreximbank, which was founded by African governments and other investors in 1993 and focuses on trade finance, obtained a $100 million financing from the Islamic Corp for the Development of the Private Sector (ICD). Afreximbank said it would use the facility to provide sharia-compliant financing to small- and medium-sized enterprises across its member countries.
It also signed two financing agreements with the International Islamic Trade Finance Corp (ITFC) worth $100 million and 50 million euros ($59.8 million) to help finance exports among African countries. Both ICD and ITFC are part of the Saudi-based Islamic Development Bank group of companies. African governments including Nigeria, Senegal and South Africa have issued Islamic bonds, or sukuk, in recent years.