Shariah Banking Projected To Grow Around 40 Pct In 2013

Jakarta, Dec 3 (ANTARA) - Bank Indonesia (the Central Bank) projects shariah banking (based on Islamic laws) will grow moderately by around 40 percent in 2013. "The pessimistic projection is below 35 percent while the moderate is 40 and the optimistic one is above 40 percent," the central bank`s deputy director-head of research division of shariah banking department, Nasirwan Ilyas, said here on Monday. He said the growth of shariah banking this year tended to slow down as compared to the growth of national bank assets that reached around 20.2 percent this year (until the third week of November). "In 2011 the assets growth was around 49 percent," he said. Nasirwan said until now the market share of shariah banks had reached 4.32 percent and he hoped it would rise to five percent early next year. "We hope 2013 would be the milestone when the growth would reach five percent for the first time," he said. "Seen from BOPO (operations expenses to operations income) and NIM (net interest margin) it tends to be better. The BOPO ratio in December 2011 was down from 85.6 percent to 82.8 percent in October 2012," he said. The Return on Assets (ROA) averagely rose from 1.8 percent in 2011 to 2.1 percent in October 2012. Nasriwan expressed optimism over shariah banking growth next year with investment now growing up to around 12 percent and increasing household consumption. "Economy is also predicted to grow between 6.3 and 6.7 percent," he added. Besides his optimism he also saw challenges that need to be overcome including process of transition in bank supervision to the Financial Service Authority (OJK). He said he hoped the transition would run smoothly.