Nur-Sultan, Republic of Kazakhstan, 29 June 2022 – An Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) mission comprising RH Almaty (RHA) and IsDBI staff members attended the fifth Astana Finance Days Conference, 27-29 June 2022.

The Astana Finance Days is a unique regional platform for professional discussion to build effective financial and economic solutions. This year, the Astana Finance Days Conference was held under the theme of “Sustainability. Social Responsibility. Growth” and featured discussions on Islamic Finance Conference, Capital Markets Forum, Retail Investors Forum, Belt and Road Initiative Session, Fin & Tech Forum, Green Growth forum, AIFC Law Conference, EdTech Forum, Investment Forum, and many other sessions.

The conference was attended by 29 countries, 13 of which participated in person. The event was officially inaugurated by the H.E. Mr. Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, President of the Republic of Kazakhstan, who in his statement touched upon the sustainability and social responsibility in the post-pandemic period and implications of the social unrest in January 2022 and aggravating geopolitical crisis claiming Kazakhstan to adopt the new economic policy to ensure resilient economic growth and to develop the open, innovative and humancentric economy.

The IsDB mission participated as speakers in the Islamic Finance Conference, which was part of the Astana Financial Days Conference, and deliberated on the session in the Islamic Finance Products and Impact Investing.

With the growth of the Islamic finance industry in the region, the AIFC has developed an enabling regulatory environment for Islamic finance and adopted the road map for further development of Islamic Finance with the aim to eventually become an international hub for the Islamic financial services industry. The AIFC has established its Islamic Finance and Business Hub that offers consultation and support to current and new market participants for licensing Islamic finance activities, and structuring and issuing Islamic finance instruments and securities.

The event also witnessed the launching of the Astana International Exchange (AIX) Retail Islamic Finance platform ETN to provide an access to individual investors to high-quality ETF Sharia-compliant stocks. The ETN index covers 27 companies from 13 countries, and it has received Fatwah from Al Ham Shariah Advisory Company. The ETN platform will be available in the Tabyz application for retail investors. 

In addition, the mission participated in the certificate awarding ceremony to the AIFC staff during its two-month capacity-building workshop of the AIFC staff, which was organized within the framework of the IsDB Technical Assistance for Development of Islamic Finance Master Plan for the Republic of Kazakhstan, where one of the components of the IsDB TA envisions the in-house capacity building training for the staff of the AIFC.