SALAMA Islamic Arab Insurance Company, the world's largest Takaful and Re-Takaful group, announced its strategic alliance with NCB Capital, the investment banking arm of National Commercial Bank, the region's largest bank, in a bid to further promote the spread of Shariah-compliant insurance solutions. Under the alliance, SALAMA will offer its customers a host of Shariah-compliant, open-ended, unit-linked funds through regular savings and protection plans, with a minimum contribution of AED200 per month. Noel D'Mello, head of Family Takaful, SALAMA, said: “In the current global financial crisis environment, most investors are skeptical about investing single contributions for the short term. SALAMA's products are designed for regular systematic savings for the medium and long term and are therefore being well received. We continue to expand and diversify our product offerings by allying with other equally strong service providers. This tie-up with NCB Capital further strengthens our presence in the UAE market and helps us to promote Shariah-compliant savings and insurance products.” A pioneer in investment banking in the region, NCB Capital has around $14 billion of assets under management and launched the world's first Shariah-compliant real estate fund. It has a wide range of funds covering all asset classes which it offers to its approximately one million clients. Mohamed Seif-El Nasr, head of Asset Management at NCB Capital, said “as one of the world's largest Shariah-compliant mutual fund managers with a significant track record spanning many years, we feel privileged to ally with an equally long-established leader in the Takaful and re-Takaful industry. We look forward to working closely with SALAMA in spreading innovative and world class Shariah-compliant investment solutions within the UAE and regionally.” The strategic alliance agreement involves SALAMA's subscription to 16 NCB Capital mutual funds including three Al-Manarah fund-of-fund portfolios. The specific portfolios vary in risk profile and benefit from diversification of geographies, asset classes, currencies and fund management styles. __
