Working in interest related companies organizations : developing software’s for the stock market

Fatawa Question

Dear Respected Scholar I am a Computer Engineering graduate and a Senior Software Engineer by profession. I am working for a company which is developing Software which could be used to analyze the Stock Market prices and do trading in the real-time. We are basically supplying our applications for the Middle East, stock brokers. Our system allows price evaluation and equity trading only (i.e. the customer should have a Buying Power). Our system also emphasizes ‘Max Floor’ price and ‘Min Floor’ price on stocks. I am involved in implementing our system basically, in the Saudi Market. In Saudi, most of the brokers are Banks. The customers should have an account with a bank for trading on stocks. The banks are basically conventional banks but they also provide an Islamic Banking channel. So, the customer can have an account in any of the channel. The stocks in the Saudi Market are both Haram and Halal stocks. The Haram stocks include Banking, Insurance etc. Even these Haram stocks include some Halal stuff through the terms of Islamic Channels (like Islamic Banking, Takaful) as I mentioned earlier. But most of the stocks are Halal stocks. I am bit confused with the fact, that whether I can develop software for this business and earn from that. When I went to discuss this matter to a local scholar, he suggested me that to identify whether this software is used most of the time (51 %) Halal or Haram, based on that we can make the decision. When I went on exploring this further, I got some information about how the stock market in Saudi is performed. There are two types of things could be done with our application. 1. Speculation 2. Manipulation As I had explained earlier, even though the software is providing some restrictions on manipulation (Max Floor, Min Floor), there are some giants doing this but not everybody. But, most of the people use it based on speculation. Could you guide me on the Islamic Ruling on developing this software ? This will not only benefit me, but also for several brothers who are working on this industry. I am expecting your reply. Regards

Fatwa

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Publication Date

2008-03-10

Main Subjects

Economics & Business Administration
Islamic Studies

No. of Pages

2

Data Type

Fatawa

Language

English

Record ID

BIM-731172

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