Brunei group poaches Deutsche Islamic subsidiary's team

Dar al Istithmar (DI), the London-based Islamic finance adviser majority-owned by Deutsche Bank, has lost its entire advisory team to the Brunei financial group BMB Capital.

The move, announced earlier this week, is believed to have surprised Deutsche Bank. DI is a joint venture between Deutsche Bank, London brokers Russell Wood and Oxford Islamic Finance, a spinoff from the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies.

The sharia board, provided by Oxford Islamic Finance, is still in place, and Deutsche Bank employees are taking up the slack for the departed team on an interim basis. Deutsche Bank has yet to name any permanent replacements.

BMB is a Dubai-owned Islamic asset management group, aimed at rich Middle Eastern and South-East Asian private investors. In a statement, it said it would rebrand the team as "BMB Islamic".

Team leader Humayon Dar attributed his departure to the involvement of "insincere" non-Islamic banks in the Islamic market: "One hears ‘sharia-compliance’ used by many other parties whose motivations are less than sincere and could be described as disingenuous. The Islamic financial services industry is being dominated by conventional banks that are eager to capture the Islamic market but without necessarily having access to truly authentic sharia advice," he said.