The initial response has been overwhelming and hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis who had never done any banking in their lives are now asking for more Islamic banks or branches in their areas. In the very first year, Islamic banking segments have captured 1.6% of the total assets of the banking system and the rate of growth is extremely fast.
In the basis of the current trends, we project that the Islamic banks will attain about 10% of the market share in the next few years. The State bank of Pakistan has developed a market-based regulatory framework including a high-powered Shari’ah Board to provide guidance on the Shari’ah compliance aspects of the business and regulations.