Islamic Finance Forum
Presented by ABANA and the U.S.–Qatar Business
Council in collaboration with the National Council on US-Arab Relations
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
9:00 am – 12:00 pm
George Washington University Law School
Jacob Burns Moot Court Room, Suite L101
2000 H Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C.
Speakers:
Shaykh Yusuf Talal DeLorenzo, Chief Shariah Officer, Shariah Capital
Umar Moghul, Partner, Murtha Cullina LLP
Aamir Rehman, Author of Gulf Capital & Islamic Finance: The Rise of the New Global Players and Dubai & Co.: Global Strategies for Doing Business in the Gulf States
Frank Vogel, Senior Fellow and Head of Muslim World Law and Islamic Finance, Institution Quraysh for Law and Policy
Ibrahim Warde, Adjunct Professor of International Business, Tufts University
Moderator:
Jean-François Seznec, Visiting Associate Professor, Georgetown University
Additional event details and speaker profiles follow.
Event
Description:
ABANA and the U.S. – Qatar Business Council and National Council on US-Arab Relations are pleased to
invite you to attend the upcoming Islamic Finance Forum during the 18th International Congress on Comparative Law. The
Forum will provide a platform for top Shariah scholars and leaders in the
industry to discuss Islamic finance and its potential to affect domestic and
global financial markets and economic growth. Topics to be addressed at the
forum include: defining Islamic Law; Shariah financial regulation and
practice as applied in Qatar and the larger GCC; how
the rise of Gulf capital is affecting financial markets—and how it should be
regulated; compatibility of Shariah institutions with U.S. law and
regulation; objections by Shariah scholars
challenging the permissibility of derivatives under Islamic Law; Islamic
Venture Capital; and Dispute Resolution - law, regulation and practice; among
other topics. Delegates of the Forum will also have the opportunity to ask
questions of top experts in Islamic finance. Lunch
will be served after the panel discussion. In view of the growing interest in
Islamic finance, the Forum is expected to draw significant interest.
Speaker
Profiles:
Shaykh
Yusuf Talal DeLorenzo is the Chief Shariah
Officer and a Board Member at Shariah Capital. He is a scholar of Islamic
Transactional Law whose 30-year career was featured in an August 2007 front-page
story in the Wall Street Journal. Based in the Washington, DC area, he
has served as a Shari'ah advisor to dozens of international financial entities,
including index providers, institutional investors, home finance providers,
international investment banks and a variety of asset managers. Shaykh Yusuf is
the author of the three volume Compendium of Legal Opinions on the
Operations of Islamic Banks, the first English/Arabic reference on the
fatwas issued by Shari'ah boards. In addition, Shaykh Yusuf wrote the
introduction to Islamic Bonds, the 2003 book that introduced Sukuk and
transformed the world's Islamic capital markets. His work has appeared in
academic and industry journals and as chapters in books, including Euromoney's
Islamic Asset Management (2004), Islamic Retail Finance (2005), and
Islamic Finance: Innovation & Growth (2002). His entries on the terminology
of Islamic finance appear in The Oxford Dictionary of Islam. Shaykh Yusuf
is often featured as a keynote speaker at conferences and seminars worldwide.
He was a special consultant to the Asian Development Bank and the Islamic
Development Bank on their joint project for the Islamic Financial Services
Board (IFSB). Shaykh Yusuf is a member of the Council of Scholars, ISRA,
Central Bank of Malaysia and a member of the Governing Council of the
International Centre for Education in Islamic Finance (INCEIF) in Malaysia.
Shaykh Yusuf recently was appointed a member of the Shariah Board of the
Accounting and Auditing Organization of Islamic Financial Institutions
(AAOIFI). Shaykh Yusuf served as Advisor on Islamic Education to the President
of Pakistan from 1981-1984. His career has also been noted in The Financial
Times, The New York Times, Fortune, Forbes, The US
News and World Report, Newsweek, CNBC, Conde Nast
Portfolio, The Middle East Banker and others.
Umar
Moghul practices in the realm of
banking & finance, private equity and real estate. Mr. Moghul has
represented an array of financial institutions, businesses, joint ventures and
high net worth individuals (many of which operate per Islamic principles), in a
variety of cutting-edge financing and investment transactions. In the realm of
real estate, Mr. Moghul's practice has included the establishment of real
estate investment funds (both onshore and offshore), joint ventures and one-off
financing transactions; novel Islamic warehouse and table funding financing
transactions; and the design and documentation of novel Islamic residential and
commercial financing products. His legal practice also encompasses counseling
financial institutions with respect to their obligations under the USA Patriot
Act. Mr. Moghul's corporate and private equity practice includes the
establishment of a variety of onshore and offshore investment fund structures
and advising on leveraged buyouts and growth equity transactions with targets
in the services, healthcare, technology, and energy sectors. Mr. Moghul has
published several articles and has spoken at numerous forums regarding Islamic
law and Islamic finance. He is a lecturer in law at the University of
Connecticut School of Law where he teaches Islamic law. Mr. Moghul earned his
J.D. from Temple University and his B.A. and M.A. from the University of
Pennsylvania.
Aamir Rehman writes and speaks on global corporate strategy, the Gulf
region, and Islamic finance. He was
Global Head of Strategy for HSBC Amanah, the worldwide Islamic finance business
unit of the HSBC Group. Prior to HSBC, he was a consultant with the Boston
Consulting Group. Mr. Rehman is the author of Gulf Capital & Islamic
Finance: The Rise of the New Global Players (McGraw-Hill, 2010), a
comprehensive look at the growing role of Gulf-based investors and the Islamic
finance sector in global markets. His first book, Dubai & Co.: Global
Strategies for Doing Business in the Gulf States (McGraw-Hill, 2007) is a
pioneering work on corporate strategy in the GCC region. Dubai & Co. has been sold worldwide, with two Chinese language
editions published in 2008. Mr. Rehman's research and commentary have been
featured in leading media outlets globally, including the Financial Times,
the Wall Street Journal and the Harvard Business Review. Mr.
Rehman is an Adjunct Scholar at the Middle East Institute, a nonpartisan
Washington, DC institution. He holds a bachelor's degree from Harvard College,
a master's degree from Harvard University, and an MBA from the Harvard Business
School. A native of Staten Island, New York, he and his wife split their time
between New York City and the Gulf region.
Frank Vogel is a specialist in Islamic law, and the President of the
International Society for Islamic Legal Studies. He is an independent scholar
at Harvard Law School, where he was previously a professor in Islamic law. Since
1988, Mr. Vogel has also worked in consulting, serving in dozens of cases as an
expert witness and consultant on questions of Islamic law, and the laws of
Afghanistan, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the U.A.E. and Pakistan. He
has conducted in-depth research and attended conferences and study tours on
Islamic law and the Islamic legal system all across Asia and the Middle East. In
addition, he has acted as organizing chair of the Islamic Law Section at the
American Association of Law Schools (AALS), and as Consultant at the Library of
Congress Islamic Law Classification (KBP) Project. Mr. Vogel has co-authored
several books on Islamic Law including The Islamic School of Law: Evolution,
Devolution and Progress and Islamic Law and Finance: Religion, Risk,
and Return. He is also the author of numerous articles covering various
subjects within Islamic law and the Middle East.
Ibrahim Warde is Adjunct Professor of International Business at The
Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and the Associate Director of Business
Programs at the Fares Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies at Tufts
University. He was named a Carnegie Scholar in 2007, in relation to his
research on financial networks and practices in the Islamic world. He is also a
course director for Euromoney Institutional Investor, London and a consultant
specializing in global finance. He has taught at the University of California
(Berkeley, Davis, and Santa Cruz), as well as at Saint Mary's College,
California. Mr. Warde's books include Islamic Finance in the Global Economy,
2nd ed. (2010), The Price of Fear: The Truth Behind the Financial War on
Terror (2007), Le modèle anglo-saxon en question (1997), and Mythologies
américaines (1996). Forthcoming books include Islam and Economics
and Guerres d'Irak. He is a contributor to Le Monde Diplomatique,
an author of monographs on banking regulation and international finance, and an
author of policy papers on global technological change published by the
Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy (BRIE).
Moderator Profile:
Jean-François
Seznec is Visiting Associate
Professor at Georgetown University's Center for Contemporary Arab Studies. His
research centers on the influence of the Arab-Persian Gulf political and social
variables on the financial and oil markets in the region. He is focusing on the
industrialization of the Gulf and in particular the growth of the petrochemical
industry. He is Senior Advisor to PFC Energy in Washington, DC. He holds a MIA
from Columbia University [1973], a MA and his Ph.D. from Yale University
[1994]. He has published and lectured extensively on Petrochemicals and energy-based
industries in the Gulf and their importance in world trade. He is interviewed
regularly on national TV, radio and newspapers, as well as by the foreign
media. Dr. Seznec has 25 years of experience in international banking and
finance of which ten years were spent in the Middle East, including two years
in Riyadh at SIDF and six years in Bahrain covering Saudi Arabia. Dr. Seznec is
a founding member and Managing Partner of the Lafayette Group LLC, a US-based
private investment company. He uses his knowledge of business in the Middle
East and the United States to further his analysis of the Arab-Persian Gulf.
For more information about the U.S. - Qatar Business Council, visit www.usqbc.org.
For more information about the National Council on US-Arab Relations, visit ncusar.org.
For more information about the 18th International Congress on Comparative Law at George Washington University Law School, visit www.law.gwu.edu.
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