Working in interest related companies organizations : working in investment management

Fatawa Question

Assaalaamu Alaykum Dr. Monzer, For the past 5 years, I have worked in the back office of Investment Management at State Street. I had been settling trades, booking trades and covering risk within Collateral Management. Our back office functions related to all of PIMCO's Derivative trades with their respective counterparties. I found a little comfort in knowing that Mohamed El-Erian, a Muslim from Egypt, was the CEO along with Bill Gross. I attached an article about Islamic Finance from my time at State Street which I believe couldn't be done had there been no Muslims in American Finance. I decided that I needed a change of venue and moved to a firm in LA in which I would not be involved in every aspect of post trading tasks. My position in LA is within the Middle Office. I primarily deal with reviewing contracts to determine eligibility, fulfill Dodd-Frank requirements (new regulatory implementations), account agreement setup and send reports to respective counterparties which have payments settling. I do not take part in sending or receiving money , the custodian banks and brokers take care of that. I used to book hundreds of trades a day and now I book just a few, if any, a week. These are Fixed Income products. I am not a trader ; I just receive the allocation from the traders and book them. I also audit trades, ratings and agreements. My functions fall under Financial Operations and not as an Advisor or Investment Manager. Please advise the permissibility of my functions within my current position. Jazakallahu Khair, Sabih

Fatwa

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Publication Date

2012-10-24

Main Subjects

Economics & Business Administration
Islamic Studies

No. of Pages

2

Data Type

Fatawa

Language

English

Record ID

BIM-731430

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