RFI Foundation launches new “RFI Insights” data portal to support responsible finance growth within Islamic markets
RFI Foundation is excited to announce the launch of a new data portal, RFI Insights, to share the results of our research in a more accessible format for financial sector stakeholders and others to support the development of responsible finance in Islamic markets. As the first nonprofit organisation principally dedicated to connecting the responsible finance and Islamic finance markets, the RFI Foundation believes in the importance of sharing the knowledge we have created through our research.
The first data available on this new website will allow anyone interested in the intersection of ESG and Islamic finance to dig into the results of our groundbreaking study conducted with INCEIF. That research study looked at the investment performance impacts of combining environmental, social and governance (ESG) screens with Shari’ah screens.
The conclusions of that research, which was also previously made available as a white paper and an academic paper, showed that Shari’ah and ESG screening cannot be viewed in isolation. Our research found differences across time periods and geographical regions in how ESG and Shari’ah screens interact, as well as evidence of different factor composition depending on whether a portfolio is high- or low-ESG and Shari’ah compliant or not.
The new database provides researchers, academics and students with the ability to dig further into the results of our analysis to enable further research to highlight the impact of combining ESG and Shari’ah screens. The study results are presented in a way for users to break down the findings by region and time period, across several different factor models as well as allowing some results to be decomposed from ESG to ‘E’, ‘S’ and ‘G’.
RFI Insights also includes six country reports that we have completed analyzing the financed emissions of Islamic markets including Malaysia, Indonesia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Bangladesh. These reports present the country-level findings of our top-down estimates for financed emissions risk across several Islamic markets encompassing bank and capital market assets across the entire economy.
Financial sector stakeholders can benefit from the insights shown in these reports as they develop strategies for aligning their institutions to national emissions targets including longer-term Net Zero targets and pledges. The reports released to date provide the starting point for RFI Foundation’s ongoing research producing estimates of financed emissions risk across the most important Islamic finance markets in the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia. The aim of expanding and disseminating our estimates is to enhance the ability for financial institutions in Islamic markets, including those offering Islamic financial services, to understand and mitigate their financed emissions risks even where emissions data gaps are significant.
More information about the RFI Insights portal can be found at www.rfi-insights.org.
