Basel Iii: Impact and Challenges to Islamic Financial Institutions: Evidence of Pakistan and Malaysia

The global financial crises 2007 bring about the current banking regulations which stood inadequate to avoid banks from taking in unnecessary risk actions. Therefore, Bank for International Settlement (BIS) and G-20 leaders endorsed a new international standard of banking regulations by revising previous Basel II rule, introduced in 2004, into Basel III in late 2010, so as to enhance the quality including quantity of capital, leverage ratio and liquidity standards, which has become a challenge for nationals to implement these strict reforms under their existing banking system. Parallel with the conventional banking system, for which the Basel Committee formulated Basel framework, Islamic banking introduced in early 1977 to 1980 in Pakistan in response to the decision by the Shariat Bench of Supreme Court, necessitates that the financial system be transformed to operate in conformity with sharia. The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) and Bank Negara Malaysia are the regulator of Islamic banks and full member of IFSB. The Islamic Financial Services Board (IFSB) established in 2002 in Malaysia as an international standard-setting organization to enforce the international regulatory and supervisory guidelines for Islamic financial organizations along with other standard setting bodies such as AAOIFI and ISDB to achieve this objective. The IFSB promotes the stability and soundness of the Islamic financial institutions by issuing guiding standards and prudential regulations for the industry, The IFSB applied Basel standards in the context of Islamic banks and its operating models. This paper critically evaluates Islamic financial institution’s regulatory and supervisory structures particularly for Pakistan and Malaysia and examines financial position after implementing Basel Accord rules. Study suggests a positive impact in case of both countries.

Impact of Siberian High Pressure on Winter-Time Climate Variability over Northern Part of Indo-Pak Region

Previous literatures have linked the variability of climate in Northern part of South Asia with El-Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) during winter season. The winter-time climate variability is explained by Siberian High pressure to more extent than that of NAO and ENSO over the mentioned region. Also, several studies presented the relationship between Arctic Oscillation (AO), Siberian High, East Asia winter temperature and monsoon. Thus, this thesis presents a fact that the Siberian High (SH) pressure is significantly responsible for the variability of winter-time climate over Northern areas of South Asia, particularly, over India and Pakistan which brings coldest air masses in the region. This thesis demonstrates the teleconnection between Siberian High pressure and wintertime climate variability over the mentioned region using “Centers of Action” (COA) approach as well as Singular Value Decomposition Analysis (SVDA). By introducing the objective indices for area-weighted pressure and the area-weighted latitude and longitude positions of the High, an analysis is carried out to show that winter precipitation and temperature in the mentioned region are significantly correlated with Siberian High pressure. This study will also explain the physical mechanisms to justify the empirical relationship between the Siberian High and regional climate by examining the composite maps of NCEP-NCAR Reanalysis data that are consistent with mathematical computations performed. The coupling between the sea-level pressure of Siberian High and wintertime climate variability has also been analyzed using SVD analysis. The results have been improved when SVDA is applied on coupled data fields.