Emirates Islamic Bank wins the UAE's most innovative Islamic bank award this year. It launched a range of innovative products and services across several business segments.

Al Rajhi Bank is named Saudi Arabia's best Islamic bank following a strong performance across several market segments.

Name of borrower: Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB)

Citi Islamic Investment Bank has had a good year in Bahrain and impressed with its debt capital markets work during the awards period.

Maybank Islamic wins best domestic Islamic bank in Malaysia following a period marked by strong financial results, impactful environmental, social and governance initiatives and landmark transactions.

Standard Chartered Saadiq saw new product launches, technological innovation and strong financial results during the awards period, and is Pakistan's best international Islamic bank this year.

HSBC Amanah has reinforced its position as the leading Islamic banking institution in Malaysia this year with robust financial performance and innovative product launches. The bank secures is name as the best international Islamic bank in the country as a result.

CIMB Niaga Syariah is Indonesia’s best international Islamic bank, having made good progress in digital and sustainability this year.

Standard Chartered Saadiq has made progress in its commitment to innovation, financial inclusivity and sustainable development, and wins Bangladesh’s best international Islamic bank category this year.

In 2023, Bank BTN, passed a number of milestones, from supporting sustainable housing to launching environmental, social and governance initiatives, and is the best Islamic bank in Indonesia this year.

Standard Bank Shari'ah Banking has focused on product innovation during the awards period and has seen impressive growth across its African operations.

Standard Bank Shari'ah Banking has been named the best Islamic bank in South Africa following a busy period in the capital markets, the launch of several market-first solutions and impactful community support work.

Islamic banks have been particularly industrious in their efforts to integrate an environmental, social and governance focus into their core strategy and operations.

There are only a few truly global banking institutions that provide a full range of sophisticated shariah-compliant advice, products and services. HSBC leads this select group, making it Euromoney’s best international Islamic bank for 2024.

It takes structuring expertise, sophistication and a good read of markets to engineer shariah-compliant structured products that perform, especially amid an uncertain and volatile global macroeconomic and markets backdrop.

Despite global sukuk issuance falling to its lowest dollar-denominated value in three years, there were still plenty of debuts, innovations and ground-breaking developments last year, and Standard Chartered Saadiq was front and centre of that, making it Euromoney’s best sukuk house for 2024.

CIMB Investment Bank is Euromoney’s best Islamic project finance house this year following its work on a range of transactions throughout the year, and for one in particular that stood out for its innovation and national importance.

Mashreq Al Islami continues to demonstrate its digital leadership in Islamic banking through the breadth and quality of the services and products it provides. It is Euromoney’s best Islamic digital bank this year.

Last year was an important one for sustainable finance in the Middle East. Dubai hosted the COP28 conference, following on from Sharm El-Sheikh in Egypt in 2022. This has well and truly put the spotlight on sustainable finance for banks, corporates and sovereigns in the region.

If you visit the website of National Bank of Bahrain (NBB), it doesn’t take long to recognise that it takes corporate responsibility seriously.

The provision of transaction services in the Middle East has become one of the most fiercely competitive parts of the market, largely concentrated around banks’ ability to support local and regional champions as well as blue-chip multinationals operating in the region.

As more banks in the Middle East invest in their digital transformations, the largest banks in the region are competing to develop new digital products and services.

If there were two areas for any investment bank’s Middle East advisory team to specialise in and prove all-round excellence in last year, they were the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and outbound transactions. JPMorgan excelled on both counts.

In the face of increasing competition among regional and global banks, HSBC has again demonstrated its financing strength and expertise in the Middle East across the breadth of markets, sectors and geographies it is a leader in.

Emirates NBD has successfully exported its small and medium-sized business banking operations from the UAE to its other core markets of Saudi Arabia and Egypt, creating a regional SME banking champion.

It was another stellar year for First Abu Dhabi Bank (FAB), under the continued leadership of group chief executive Hana Al Rostamani.

Emirates NBD Private Banking has a proven track record across wealth management in the Middle East. The Dubai-based firm scooped several wins at this year’s Euromoney private banking awards across global wealth management.

HSBC dominated the region’s debt capital markets across the awards period, completing 52 DCM transactions worth a total of $10.3 billion, according to data from Dealogic. In equity capital markets, the London-headquartered lender came second, completing seven deals worth $2 billion. It also ranked in initial stock offerings, completing six IPOs worth $1.38 billion in total.

In an interview with Euromoney, European Banking Authority chair José Manuel Campa joins the European Central Bank and others in pressuring banks to do more to prepare for geopolitical risks spreading from Russia to China, the US and Middle East.

Rumours that Chinese insurer Ping An could cut its stake in HSBC further, perhaps selling to a Middle East buyer at a time when Gulf investment is flooding into the People’s Republic, should not come as a surprise.