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Faisal Islamic Bank of Egypt
Faisal Islamic Bank of Egypt opened its doors in 1979 as the country's pioneer in Islamic banking, established under Law No. 48 with founding shareholders...
Faisal Islamic Bank of Egypt
Faisal Islamic Bank of Egypt opened its doors in 1979 as the country's pioneer in Islamic banking, established under Law No. 48 with founding shareholders including Saudi royal Prince Mohammed Al Faisal and prominent Egyptian investors. The bank was chartered to offer financial services compliant with Shariah law at a time when Egypt's state-dominated banking sector provided no faith-based alternative, positioning it as both a financial institution and a social infrastructure project from day one. Its asset deployment centers on profit-and-loss-sharing instruments rather than interest-bearing loans. The financing book spans corporate trade finance via murabaha, real estate and project equity through musharaka partnerships, and equipment and property leasing under ijara contracts. A significant portion of historical deployment concentrated on Egyptian real estate development and cross-border trade facilitation between Egypt and Gulf Cooperation Council markets — particularly Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates — reflecting the bank's founding ties. The bank also manages a suite of Shariah-compliant investment pools and issues letters of credit and guarantee for importers navigating Egypt's foreign-exchange environment. Public disclosures on total assets under management are not maintained in the format allocators typically seek. The bank operates from its headquarters in Giza with a branch network concentrated in Greater Cairo and Alexandria. Faisal Islamic Bank of Egypt is a publicly listed entity on the Egyptian Exchange, subject to Central Bank of Egypt supervision alongside oversight from a Shariah Supervisory Board — a dual governance layer that separates it structurally from conventional joint-stock banks in the market. What distinguishes the institution is its statutory origin as a legislated Islamic banking experiment later adopted as a permanent fixture. Unlike commercial banks that added Islamic windows as an afterthought, Faisal Islamic Bank was purpose-built under a dedicated law, with its Shariah board wielding genuine veto power over product design. That architecture — and the early Saudi-Egyptian cross-border capital link — provided a blueprint subsequently copied by Al Baraka Bank and other regional Islamic entrants.
General information
Firm type
Bank / Wealth / Trust
Year founded
1979
Location
Region
Middle East
Country
Egypt
City
Giza
Corporate office
Giza, Egypt
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
What is the founding story and legislative basis for Faisal Islamic Bank of Egypt?
The bank was established under Egypt's Law No. 48 of 1977, which created a carve-out from conventional banking regulation to permit Shariah-compliant operations. Prince Mohammed Al Faisal Al Saud, a son of King Faisal of Saudi Arabia, was a driving force behind its creation, serving as a founding shareholder alongside Egyptian investors. The resulting institution opened in 1979 as the country's first Islamic bank, with a mandate to serve depositors who had previously been excluded from the formal banking system on religious grounds.
How are investment and financing decisions structured to comply with Shariah principles?
The bank avoids interest entirely. Financing is structured as murabaha (cost-plus trade finance where the bank purchases an asset and sells it to the client at a disclosed markup), musharaka (joint venture equity partnerships), or ijara (lease-to-own arrangements). A Shariah Supervisory Board of Islamic scholars reviews all products and significant transactions before approval, and that board's rulings are binding on management — not advisory.
Who runs investment decisions at Faisal Islamic Bank of Egypt?
Day-to-day credit and investment decisions rest with the bank's executive management and credit committee under the supervision of a board of directors. The Shariah Supervisory Board provides an additional layer of ex-ante product approval and ex-post compliance audit that has no equivalent in a conventional bank's governance structure. Specific named principals are not consistently disclosed in English-language public filings, which presents a diligence gap for non-Arabic-speaking allocators.
Does Faisal Islamic Bank of Egypt maintain any philanthropic or social finance structures?
Like most Islamic financial institutions, the bank administers a zakat fund drawn from shareholder and institutional obligations under Shariah, though the scale and governance separation of that fund from the bank's balance sheet are not detailed in publicly available English-language disclosures. The broader Faisal group, through entities like the Dar Al Maal Al Islami Trust, has historically maintained philanthropic programs across education and healthcare in Muslim-majority countries.
What is the bank's known posture on co-investments alongside external partners?
The musharaka financing model is inherently a co-investment structure — the bank takes an equity stake in a project alongside the client rather than lending at a fixed return. For larger real estate and infrastructure projects, the bank has historically participated in syndicated club deals with other Gulf-based Islamic financial institutions, though its co-investment appetite with non-Islamic GPs would require direct clarification from the bank's treasury or corporate banking desk.
Profile maintained by Altss using OSINT (open-source intelligence), regulatory filings, licensed data partners, and verified direct submissions. Read the methodology. Last updated: . Continuous refresh with full update cycles at least every 30 days.
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