Islamic finance has a long history. However, it has only developed on a global scale over the last 30 years.

Islamic finance reached the UK in the 1980s with the first commodity Murabaha transactions and the launch of the first UK Islamic bank, Al Barakara International in 1982. During the 1980s a number of investment banks offered bespoke Sharia compliant products to their Middle Eastern clients, mostly in the areas of trade finance, leasing and project finance.