Islamic finance: a growing industry the proliferation of interest-free finance

The recent financial crisis which originated from the 2007 US sub-prime crisis has been labelled as the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression by George Soros, Joseph Stiglitz, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) (Jaffee, 2008; Tong and Wei, 2008). It has now become a full-blown global economic crisis. Due to the borderless nature of the global economy, the economic downturn in the United States has created a systemic shock that has been transmitted to the economies around the world. So, the crisis has inflicted heavy damage on markets and institutions at the core of the global financial system (IMF, 2008). While many believe that the "worst is not over", continuous deliberations are ongoing to diagnose the root of the crisis and find solutions to the current problems that the global economy is facing. Just like the cases of previous crises, once the crisis sets in, continuous efforts are undertaken to improve and strengthen the current financial infrastructure so as to avoid such crisis from happening again in the future. This crisis of 2008 is unprecedented in its nature. Even the well-established and what is considered "too big to fail" financial institutions are being badly affected by the crisis (Citibank, Lehman Brothers and AIG, just to name a few)