What Is Islamic Finance?

“When it comes to Islamic Finance, the Islamic legal scholar Frank Vogel says Americans have nothing to worry about.” He discusses the rise of Islamic banking with The American Prospect: In response to the question, ‘How is Islamic finance different from secular finance?’ Vogel says: “The difference is, for example, that they don’t charge interest. They can’t indulge in some particularly risky or speculative transactions. There’s actually a whole long list of requirements, such as not selling debt, that are derived from these basic prohibitions against interest taking and against excessive risk. So because of those specific rulings, they have to design the transactions in slightly different ways.”