This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on October 4, 2017

KUALA LUMPUR: The Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) has released a textbook on the theories and practices governing sukuk across various jurisdictions, with a global perspective.

Called Sukuk: Principles & Practices, the book was published by the SC jointly with the International Shari’ah Research Academy for Islamic Finance (ISRA), which was established by Bank Negara Malaysia in 2008.

The book was launched yesterday by the sultan of Perak, Sultan Nazrin Muizzuddin Shah, at the Kuala Lumpur Islamic Finance Forum 2017 here.

“[The book] serves as a vital source of reference for academicians, students and practitioners to gain a greater understanding of sukuk and in turn, contribute towards continuing growth and expansion of the sukuk market globally,” the SC and ISRA said in a joint statement.

They said the publication of the textbook is timely in view of the increasing role of sukuk as an important source of capital formation to finance the development of a country’s economy.

“Malaysia continues to be the world’s largest sukuk market, characterised by the presence of innovative sukuk structures, diversity of domestic and foreign issuers and investors, as well as availability of various maturities and currency denominations.

“The global significance of Malaysia’s sukuk market is the result of orderly development of the sukuk market ecosystem, and broad acceptance of sukuk globally as a viable mechanism to raise capital as evidenced by the growing number of countries, including non-Muslim ones, that have issued or [are] planning to issue sukuk,” said the SC and ISRA.

They noted that more recently, Malaysia witnessed the issuance of the world’s first green sukuk under the SC’s Sustainable & Responsible Investment Sukuk framework.