KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 1): Maybank Islamic Bhd, the Islamic banking arm of Malayan Banking Bhd (Maybank), has no plans to go for a listing, according to Maybank Islamic chief executive officer Datuk Mohamed Rafique Merican.

He said the bank's primary focus is to strengthen its Islamic banking franchise to cater for its customers globally.

“[There's] no plans. I think for us, the focus is to strengthen the Maybank Islamic franchise, and I believe that through our offering of Islamic wealth management, it will create return values for our customers [in] Malaysia and beyond (its operations outside Malaysia),” he told reporters after Maybank Asset Management Sdn Bhd’s shariah-compliant artificial intelligence-powered hyper-customised discretionary portfolio mandate launch on Wednesday.

Besides Malaysia, Maybank Islamic, which is the largest Islamic banking group by assets in Asean, also has a presence in Indonesia, Singapore, Hong Kong, the UK and the United Arab Emirates, according to its latest annual report.

In August, Bursa Malaysia Bhd chairman Tan Sri Abdul Wahid Omar encouraged listed banking companies to look into shariah-compliant instruments, so that their Islamic banking arms can be listed on the stock exchange.

Abdul Wahid, who served as Maybank's president and CEO from 2008 to 2013, said several banks listed on Bursa, such as Maybank, CIMB, Public Bank and RHB Bank, are still classified as conventional despite a portion of their business being shariah-compliant.

At 3.43pm on Wednesday, Maybank shares were two sen or 0.22% lower at RM9, giving the group a market capitalisation of RM108.54 billion.

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