Despite the rapid growth that Qatar – and its banking sector – has experienced in recent years, the country's government is not resting on its laurels and is actively looking to address issues such as an overcrowding of the market, overdependence on foreign funding and the economy’s lack of diversification.
One of the few countries to remain largely unaffected by the global financial downturn, Saudi Arabia's economy is growing at a pace and, despite its expansionary fiscal policy, it continues to post a budgetary surplus. It has now started to put this capital to work in tackling pressing social issues, such as its high unemployment rate and housing shortage.
Government spending has kept the Saudi Arabian economy buoyant over the past few years, allowing the country's banks to maintain a healthy profit level in 2012. And their prosperity is showing no signs of waning, with an ambitious home ownership target spurring growth in the mortgage market and momentum building in the small and medium-sized enterprise space.
Saudi Arabia's investment banking industry is gaining momentum, thanks in large part to a region-wide uptick in bond issuance, in mergers and acquisitions and growing demand for project finance. But the evolution of this sector is far from over, as the country's bankers turn their minds to deepening the markets and encouraging the liberalisation of the stock exchange.
With Lebanon's economy feeling the strains of political infighting and the two-year civil war in neighbouring Syria, its banks have been looking overseas in search of growth, establishing footholds in countries such as Turkey and Iraq, as well as seeking to consolidate their presence in Egypt and the Gulf.
Year upon year, the Islamic finance industry posts stellar growth figures. However, as large Western lenders withdraw from the sector, is Islamic finance in as healthy a shape as the figures suggest? The Banker asks a number of experts in the field what the future holds for sharia-compliant banking.
Ongoing regional instability has taken its toll on Jordan’s banks, which are feeling the impact of a sharp slowdown in the real estate and construction sectors. But with the central bank receiving praise for its response to the crisis, what are the country’s prospects for recovery?
Iraq's banking sector is struggling to put its ever-increasing assets to work, a situation not helped by the fact that it is dominated by inefficient state-owned institutions. Can an influx of foreign banks – and the technology and expertise they bring – help transform the sector, or will development hinge on the state-owned banks' ability to reform?
Islamic finance is increasingly being viewed as a credible alternative to conventional finance, but Hussain Al-Qemzi, group chief executive of Dubai-based Noor Investment Group and chief executive of Noor Islamic Bank, recognises that Islamic institutions must work together if they are to compete with conventional banks.
Despite holding core values of social and economic development, questions remain about how beneficial Islamic finance has been for the majority of the Arab world. Could the emergence of crowd-funding platforms help to generate a more equitable distribution of wealth?
Arab banks offset the turmoil of the Arab Spring and offered a robust performance in 2011 with impressive growth across the key financial indicators. And with minimal exposure to the eurozone crisis, the region's banks are expected to continue their recovery from the global financial crisis.