Al Hilal Bank bags 4 major awards at IFN Deals of the Year 2014 Awards

UAE, March 03, 2015 - Al Hilal Bank, the progressive Abu Dhabi - headquartered Islamic Bank wholly owned by the Abu Dhabi Investment Council, has announced that it has won  four major honors at the Islamic Finance News Deals of the Year 2014 Awards held yesterday (Monday, March 2, 2015) at Ritz Carlton  Hotel, Dubai International Financial Centre.

Three of the recognitions - ‘Perpetual Deal of the Year,’ ‘Regulatory Capital Deal of the Year’ and ‘UAE Deal of the Year’ - were for Al Hilal Bank’s USD 500 million Basel III-compliant Tier 1 sukuk offering which represented the first transaction of its kind in the UAE.

Al Hilal Bank also won for ‘Commodity Murabaha Deal of the Year’ for its role as one of the Joint Lead Arrangers for the USD 120 million ‘Murabaha’ private placement sukuk for Drake & Scull International (DSI) in November 2014. The DSI sukuk transaction represents the first-ever sukuk based on ‘Murabaha’ trades of Shariah-compliant certificates on the recently established NASDAQ Dubai Murabaha Platform.

Mohamed Jamil Berro, Group CEO, Al Hilal Bank, said: “Last year we pushed our quality of Islamic banking services to the next level by engaging in a number of pioneering and record-setting transactions. The result was an outstanding year-long performance, more trust and confidence from our clients and partners, and greater respect from the global financial community. These awards reflect our continuous drive for excellence and our commitment to surpass the expectations of our patrons and our industry in general.”

“The year 2014 was a breakthrough period for Islamic finance in terms of innovation, benchmarks, and record-setting deals from several new markets, players and sectors. Al Hilal Bank is honored to have been awarded not just once but four times by Islamic Finance News, a vital voice for global Islamic banking and finance - for participating in some of the biggest Islamic finance transactions of last year. This gives us a strong motivation to raise the bar further in 2015 and beyond in terms of service and product excellence,” said Lim Say Cheong, EVP of Investment Banking Group at Al Hilal Bank.

The Islamic Finance News Deals of the Year 2014 Awards list was presented in the inaugural 2015 issue of Islamic Finance News, the industry’s leading capital markets focused e-newsletter owned by publishing and events company REDmoney. The best deals for 2014 were chosen by the Awards Board via a rigorous and robust judging process based on peer nominations and expert independent industry analysis.