Al Tamimi & Company, the Middle East’s largest law firm,
recently acted as legal counsel for Boubyan Bank K.S.C.P., a Kuwaiti Islamic
bank firm headquartered in Salmiya, in the issuance of sukuk worth $250 million.
Boubyan Bank’s investment division, Boubyan Capital, handled
international coordination in partnership with Standard Chartered and HSBC. Al
Tamimi’s leader and partner Alex Saleh, along with senior associate Omar
Handoush and associates El Hassan Abdelrazek and Abdullah Masud, led the
transaction.
The event was the first Kuwaiti-issued sukuk transaction to
enhance Tier 1 capital, defined as the core measure of a bank’s financial
adequacy or strength as determined by an industry regulator. Tier 1 usually consists
of core capital (primarily of common stock and disclosed reserves or
retained earnings), but may also include nonredeemable noncumulative
preferred stock.
“We are very excited to have had the opportunity to
work on the first Tier 1 Capital sukuk issuance emanating out of Kuwait with Boubyan
Bank,” Saleh said. “We expect that this transaction will serve as a template
for other Islamic banks in Kuwait and the region as more Islamic banks will try
to increase their liquidity through the issuance of Shari’a compliant debt
instruments.”
To guaranty Shariah compliance, the transaction used a
Mudarabah structure. Going forward, it will be listed on NASDAQ and the Irish
Stock Exchange.
Al Tamimi & Company operates 16 offices throughout the
Middle East, including Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Qatar, Saudi
Arabia, Iraq, Jordan, Oman and Bahrain.
