The First Islamic Business Credit Card In Asia Pacific Is Here

The first Shariah-compliant business credit card in Asia Pacific, Bank Islam Visa Infinite Business Card-i, was launched by Visa International (Asia-Pacific) LLC and Bank Islam Malaysia Bhd on Tuesday.

The credit card allows the cardholder to get instant claim on value-added tax on their spending overseas, said Ng Kong Boon, Malaysia’s country manager at Visa International.

The main target market of the business card is small and medium enterprises, he said, and he expects good market acceptance as one-third of Malaysia’s gross domestic product comes from this segment.

The Bank Islam Visa Infinite Business Card-i comes with no compounding finance charges, a 20-day profit-charge-free period, lifetime annual fee waiver, as well as financing limit up to RM250,000.

“The Business Card-i enables businesses to separate and consolidate business-related spending in one card and the detailed monthly statement eases the tracking of this spending,” said Datuk Seri Zukri Samat, managing director of Bank Islam.

“We believe the multiple benefits of this product make it especially attractive in the current environment, where businesses demand greater convenience to support their operations,” he added.

The new credit card will increase the bank’s portfolio and product mix. He added that Bank Islam hopes to reach 10% of its current corporate and commercial customer base of about 200,000 clients in the first three years after the introduction of the card.

In the period of June 1, 2015 to May 31, 2016, Visa saw credit card transactions in Malaysia amounting to US$20 billion, said Ng.

“Out of the total transaction value, about 10% was business credit, and 30% of this US$2 billion was related to online and cross-border transactions,” he said.

Bank Islam, a wholly-owned subsidiary of BIMB Holdings Bhd, has contributed 5% of BIMB’s total revenue from its credit card segment, said the bank’s deputy chief executive officer Khairul Kamarudin.

The management intends to double the figure in the next three years, he added. Currently, BIMB has about 150,000 active credit cardholders and two million debit cardholders.

As at end-June this year, credit cards represented 1.2% (RM444.89 million) of BIMB’s total financing portfolio of RM37.03 billion.

BIMB closed unchanged at RM4.02 yesterday, valuing the banking group at RM6.39 billion.

[Source]