the Halal Jihadist (HalalJihadist@gmail.com)

World Quran Recitation List

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Sun, 27 Mar 2022 18:57:00 +0000

Stay tuned, we are crowd sourcing a list of Quran recitations from around the world.

Please contribute here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSciC5ty7vtUEdA4UPNFlrwdYWGElhDBGUSm8zN7UQ-Ason49Q/viewform?usp=sf_link

The list will be shared starting Ramadan 2022 and each Jumah through the month.

A video I have been waiting for - is machine slaughter halal

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Sat, 08 Jan 2022 03:56:00 +0000

Muslims can be bought, Islam cannot.

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Thu, 03 Sep 2020 01:56:00 +0000

"Muslims can be bought, Islam cannot." says The Halal Jihadist

As 'Muslim Countries' around the world turn their backs on the plight of the Uyghurs' of Xinjiang Province of China, in exchange for foreign investment as part of the communist parties Silk Road initiative, campuses are brimming with the din of Islam.

Surveillance of Students @ McMaster University, in Ontario by Chinese Consultant

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/angry-over-campus-speech-by-uighur-activist-students-in-canada-contact-chinese-consulate-film-presentation/2019/02/14/a442fbe4-306d-11e9-ac6c-14eea99d5e24_story.html

83 Companies Linked to Uyghur Slave Labour

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Fri, 17 Jul 2020 01:42:00 +0000

Your Brand = Uyghur slave labour

Business & Human Rights Resource Centre invited Abercrombie & Fitch, adidas, Amazon, BMW, Gap, H&M, Inditex, Marks & Spencer, Nike, North Face, Puma, PVH, Samsung and UNIQLO to respond; their responses are provided. We invited Apple, Esprit, Fila and Victoria's Secret to respond; they did not.

83 foreign and Chinese companies are allegedly directly or indirectly benefiting from the use of Uyghur workers outside Xinjiang through potentially abusive labour transfer programs.

ASPI reached out to the 83 brands to confirm their relevant supplier details. Where companies responded before publication, they have included their relevant clarifications in their report.

Link: https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/china-83-major-brands-implicated-in-report-on-forced-labour-of-ethnic-minorities-from-xinjiang-assigned-to-factories-across-provinces-includes-company-responses

What does Islam say about the death of George Floyd

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Sun, 05 Jul 2020 04:24:00 +0000

What Islam says about the death of George Floyd

Dr Zakir Explains

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Thu, 30 Apr 2020 16:41:00 +0000

Ramadan is a time of REFLECTION ...

"REFLECT on what you can do this Ramadan and this year to further Islam through your own actions." Halal Jihadist

It could be something as simple as learning about what constitutes halal meat (hint: it includes animal welfare) and changing your purchasing behaviour, thus forcing suppliers to raise and slaughter animals in a human and ethical manner.

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"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed it is the one thing that ever has" Margaret Mead

Counterfeit Fatwas

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Wed, 15 Apr 2020 05:08:00 +0000

"Religion is the best businesses, people pay a premium for what they know are counterfeit goods because they believe the guard at the door to heaven is going to absolve them of accountability because a guy with a beard told them the goods were legit." The Halal Jihadist

What scholars have to say

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Sat, 23 Nov 2019 01:16:00 +0000

I believe that an intelligent critic can be an excellent teacher as can a like minded scholar. It is about opening oneself to points of view and knowledge that sharpens one's own intelligence.

In this video:
1) What Quran says about sectarianism (https://quran.com/6/159 Surah 6 Verse 159)
2) The benchmark we should hold scholars to and where they rank in the knowledge ladder

Can You Earn a Reasonable Return on Real Estate without Debt ?

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Sun, 17 Nov 2019 20:57:00 +0000

Question:
Can you earn a reasonable return on real estate without debt?

Answer:
Yes you can. But you need to be proactive and not wait for the opportunity rather find it.

That is what I did recently. I searched out a development, entered into negotiations with the developer before permits where in place for the project and negotiated a price that I expect will generate an annual 12% ROI. Not only that, but I secured pricing that makes it possible to purchase without debt and given that a few of us have joined together in a partnership it has become an exceptionally affordable investment.

But it must be risky, you are thinking. Not at all. We entered into an in-Trust purchase agreement, meaning our biggest risk is the project not proceeding (e.g. permit issues) and us receiving our money back (per the contract) eleven months after we advanced our $500 deposit.

If you are interested in learning more, let me know via email.

Introducing Our Model Portfolio | 2-year performance betters 5-year MSCI World Islamic Index

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Sun, 17 Nov 2019 20:38:00 +0000

I have built a model portfolio for the last 6 years that has produced a 25+% CAGR.

The iShares MSCI World Islamic UCITS ETF has returned -9.37% in 2018 vs our +9.1% for a difference of +18.47% in 2018. Over a longer period, 5 years, MSCI produced only a cumulative return of 26.38%. Meaning if you invested $100 at the end of 5 years you would have had $126.38. In all 2 year periods except one the model portfolio has outperformed the 5-year return of iShares MSCI World Islamic UCITS ETF - in 2-year our model portfolio has made more than the ETF has in 5-years ! (source: https://www.ishares.com/uk/professional/en/products/251394/ishares-msci-world-islamic-ucits-etf?switchLocale=y&siteEntryPassthrough=true )

Some highlights that are noteworthy
1. The lack of correlation to the market, meaning the portfolio does not move in step with the market.
2. The securities purchased that account for 80% of the portfolio are large businesses. They provide global diversification and reduced risk
3. We have held several of our top 10 securities for 5+ years, we are not chasing what is on the Wall Street menu

Mismanagement of Alberta's Oil

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Wed, 23 Oct 2019 00:05:00 +0000

Much has been said about the need to support the Oil industry but few have held the industry and Alberta government to account for the the current situation. The current economic plight of Alberta is in part a function of Alberta's own shortsighted conservative mindset.

Let me elaborate. This is not Alberta's first bear market, and it will not be the last. So why was there no preparation for another bust given the history of boom and bust? What made Alberta believe they could build a pipeline on someone else's land when they would have fought with equal vigor had their land been earmarked for conservation vs drilling? What made Alberta believe it did not have to save for a rainy day? What rational resulted in betting the house on being an exporter of a commodity versus investing to make Alberta a value-added player? It is time Albertans and the media ask these questions of the conservative government that has ruled the province.

During the boom times, there are multiple things Alberta could have done, but did not. They could have...

Behaved like the socialist Norwegians and establish an Oil Fund to invest royalties of the petroleum sector
Implement a Provincial Sales Tax and store the money for a rainy day
Invest in value added products
Invested in clean energy, the knowledge economy
Invested in the indigenous communities of Canada before they needed them

Instead, the government chose lower taxes, leaving the money in the hands of trickle down economics that left future investment in the hands of those who were a defacto better steward and investor of capital for Albertans. Clearly this strategy has not worked.

Oil is not going away, nor is Canada's support for the West, but the West needs to act responsibly and cannot creditably ask for government help like a socialist would while decrying government interference as a conservative capitalist would.

Student Loans, a % of earnings in a risk sharing agreement

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Fri, 12 Apr 2019 23:00:00 +0000

The article below speaks to how some US Universities are extending to students a risk sharing loan program as an alternative to interest bearing student loans.

The structure is Islamic, more so than many of the "sharia compliant bonds". The concept is a pure risk sharing model and a great foundation for a true Islamic loan. "Fair" is paramount in Islamic finance, so expect a degree of variance in loan programs as some unscrupulous lender looks to take advantage of a students.

As a community, would not a fund developed to finance student fees based on a similar model be beneficial to our local Umahs?

Source: https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/businessweek/u-s-college-grads-sell-stakes-in-themselves-to-wall-street-1.1241543

U.S. college grads sell stakes in themselves to Wall Street

Claire Boston, Bloomberg News

Amy Wroblewski , Maura Friedman for Bloomberg Businessweek

(Bloomberg Businessweek) -- To pay for college, Amy Wroblewski sold a piece of her future. Every month, for eight-and-a-half years, she must turn over a set percentage of her salary to investors. Today, about a year after graduation, Wroblewski makes US$50,000 a year as a higher education recruiter in Winchester, Va. So the cut comes to US$279 a month, less than her car payment.

If the 23-year-old becomes a star in her field, she could pay twice as much. If she loses her job, she won’t have to pay anything, and investors will be out of luck until she finds work.

Wroblewski struck this unusual deal as an undergraduate at public Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind. To fund part of the cost of her degree in strategy and organizational management, she sidestepped the common source of money, a student loan. Instead, she agreed to hand over part of her future earnings through a new kind of financial instrument called an income-sharing agreement, or ISA. In a sense, financiers are transforming student debtors into stock investments, with much of the same risk and, ideally, return.

In Wall Street terms, Wroblewski, a first-generation college student, is more small-company stock than Microsoft. Her mother works as a waitress; her father, as a quality control inspector in a car dealership’s body shop. With a strong work ethic, Wroblewski always held down at least two part-time jobs in school, working as a Purdue teaching assistant, a Target cashier, and an Amazon seasonal worker. Showing potential for leadership—not to mention earnings—she rose to vice president of Delta Sigma Pi, a business fraternity.

Those qualities impressed a company called Vemo Education, which vets students at Purdue and a handful of other schools on behalf of potential investors. More important, perhaps, Wroblewski believes in herself and her ability to make good on the contract. “Even with all my other loans, I knew I could make it work,” says Wroblewski.

Americans owe US$1.5 trillion in higher education debt, a burden that weighs down their dreams and the U.S. economy. The Federal Reserve says millennials are now less likely to buy homes than young people were in 2005, and even senior citizens find themselves still making payments on their student loans. Wall Street sees the crisis as an opportunity. College graduates on average earn US$1 million more over their lifetimes. Investors could capture some of that wage premium for themselves.

“I envision a whole new equity market for higher education in the next five years where today there’s only debt,” says Chuck Trafton, who runs hedge fund FlowPoint Capital Partners LP, which has invested in ISAs, including Purdue’s. ISA experts say they have fielded calls from some of the world's largest investment managers that are considering investing in the contracts. And Tony James, executive vice chairman of money manager Blackstone Group LP, formed the Education Finance Institute to help schools study and develop ISAs.

For now, the market for income-sharing agreements can be measured in the tens of millions, a tiny sum compared with the US$170 billion in outstanding asset-backed securities created from student loans. Only some schools let outside investment firms buy a stake in students. Others seek out individual donors, mostly wealthy alumni, or use money from their own endowments.

Along with Purdue, which started its program in 2016, some smaller private schools such as Lackawanna College in Scranton, Pa., and Norwich University in Vermont are offering ISAs. The University of Utah recently announced a pilot plan.

ISAs raise all kinds of questions. How many students will lose their jobs and be unable to pay? How much should Wall Street demand as compensation for the risk? Investors typically ask for a smaller slice from students with more lucrative majors. At Purdue, for example, English majors borrowing US$10,000 pay 4.52 per cent of their future income over nearly 10 years; chemical engineers, 2.57 per cent in a bit over seven years.

Purdue set up its program to be competitive with many student loans for the typical borrower. Consider a junior economics major who needs US$10,000. Through a private loan, she’d likely pay US$146 a month, or US$17,576 over the course of 10 years. Through an ISA, a student with a starting salary of $47,000, Purdue’s estimate for its 2020 economics graduates, would pay US$15,673, assuming 3.8 per cent annual salary increases. That would be a good deal. But, if she found a US$60,000-a-year job, she’d have to fork over US$20,010.

Financial firms and for-profit colleges have been known to prey on college students’ financial naiveté to sell them high-priced private student loans, rather than steer them toward more favourable government-backed ones. While schools offering ISAs say they will offer them only after government loans with the most favorable terms are exhausted, some students may end up again with regrets.

“There’s a level of enthusiasm that’s overstated,” says Julie Margetta Morgan, a fellow who studies higher education at the Roosevelt Institute, a think tank focused on reducing income inequality. “It’s pretty darn near impossible to say whether an ISA is better or worse for an individual.” Morgan dislikes that ISAs require arbitration, which means students give up their right to sue in court.

The last big ISA experiment—at Yale University in the 1970s—ended up as a cautionary tale. Yale pooled all borrowers, and they owed the school a percentage of their incomes for 35 years, or until everyone paid back what they owed. The idea was that graduates who ended up with high-paying jobs in finance would subsidize those who chose public service.

But many students defaulted, leaving the remaining borrowers on the hook longer than they’d anticipated. Other wealthier students exited the pools via large one-time buyout payments. The remaining students tended to be lower-income. Some stopped paying altogether. Yale ultimately bailed out the borrowers, winding down the whole program in 2001.

Juan Leon, who sells business jets for Dassault Aviation SA, graduated from Yale in 1974 with a degree in urban studies. He borrowed US$1,500 through the college’s “Tuition Postponement Option.” By the late 1990s, he’d paid back US$8,000. “We didn’t read the fine print,” Leon says. “It was quite, quite onerous.”

Students have more protection under newer plans. Purdue, for example, caps total payments at 2.5 times what a student borrowed, so the most successful don’t feel gouged. And students making less than US$20,000 a year won’t be charged at all, as long as they are working full time or seeking work. Those who are working part time or not seeking work will only have their payments deferred, which means that they’ll owe for a longer period of time.

Purdue has arranged more than 700 contracts worth US$9.5 million and closed two investment funds totaling US$17 million. David Cooper, Purdue’s chief investment officer, helped to develop the program and pitch it to investors after almost a decade of overseeing investments for Indiana’s retirement system. He says the funds are drawing more interest now that the oldest contracts have over 20 months of repayment data. “We feel like we’ve got the pricing for the students at a pretty good spot,” Cooper says. “At the same time, it’s a reasonable return for the investors.”

Purdue’s early funds attracted investments from wealthy individuals, as well as nonprofit Strada Education Network and INvestEd, a nonprofit lender and financial literacy organization in Indiana. Cooper says ISAs may make most sense for socially conscious investors, but he points out that even funds seeking lofty profits might one day be interested if they can juice returns with leverage.

Charlotte Hebert, 23, who graduated from Purdue in 2017, has mixed feelings about the US$27,000 she took out from an ISA to pay for her senior-year costs. A professional writing major, she’s required to shell out 10 per cent of her income for the term of the deal. That’s about 2.5 percentage points more than an engineer would pay. The daughter of a teacher and a nurse, she makes about US$38,000 a year as a technical writer for an engineering firm in Lafayette, Ind.

She pays investors US$312 a month. “I don’t think it’s the perfect solution,” Hebert says. “I am of the opinion that in a society where most of its workers need a college education, nobody should be paying this much to be what is considered a functional member of society.

Grand Medina Resort

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Sun, 20 Jan 2019 06:17:00 +0000

Grand Medina Nature Reserve & Beach Resort

https://www.owngrandmedina.com/

Are your intrigued by The Grand Medina Nature Reserve and Beach Resort investment opportunity, which is being billed as “THE FIRST MUSLIM FAMILY-FRIENDLY RESORT IN THE AMERICAS”?

We evaluated it as primarily an investment and secondly as to Islamic values, and our opinions can be broadly categorized into the following four themes:

What constitutes Muslim family friendly
How halal is the investment opportunity
Are there really “No additional costs such as maintenance, property or insurance fees” for the first 1200 purchasers.
Is this a good investment

In summary, while we may visit the Grand Medina Resort, we would not be investors. Given the additional costs we uncovered, and the capped return versus the development risk, we personally did not find that this investment fit our requirements.

To those at Grand Medina Resort, if you find any error in our evaluation, please do comment and provide supporting documents by email.

What constitutes Muslim family friendly

After reviewing the marketing materials and the purchase documents shared with a prospective buyer, we found that in the marketing materials there is mention of a women’s only area, halal food and drink and prayer areas; we did not find a guarantee to the same in the purchase documents nor did we come across any governance model that would address ‘what is halal’. Given the cultural breadth of the Muslim community, who will determine what is acceptable e.g. what can be worn at the in common areas, dinning areas and on the beach?

How Halal is the Investment Opportunity

In the financial structure of the development nothing led us to believe this project is interest (riba) free. We looked at the backgrounds of participants and their business interests and found there was no assurance this development was or would be riba free despite the association in marketing material to brands such as ISNA. If we where to rely solely on the background and past projects of participants, we would conclude that this will be a riba based project – not halal.

In summary, while your money may be halal, we cannot affirm that the development dollars to construct will be nor if the ongoing operations will meet one’s personal expectations let alone Quranic.

“No additional costs such as maintenance, property or insurance fees”

The resort is promoted as not being a timeshare and with no additional costs. Here is what it says in the legal documents:

“III. HOTEL OWNER and SERVICE PROVIDER have entered into … certain units designated for timeshare use …”
“4. ALL‐INCLUSIVE PLAN. … PURCHASER and PURCHASER’S GUESTS must pay the mandatory All‐Inclusive Daily Fees …”

Conclusion, according to the contract this is a timeshare and there are fees payable upon use. The All-Inclusive Daily Fees are not stated but reference is made to a 20% discount to Unit purchasers off the Rack Rate.

We discovered the Rack Rate is currently US$150 or US$120 per person after discount, and we did not see any reference to these fees being capped or indexed to inflation. For a purchaser of the Partners Club Unit, a couple would pay US$300 per night or US$1680 per week between November to April before flights and transportation.

While it may not have the maintenance fees of a timeshare, it is a timeshare without the benefits of a timeshare (e.g. points that can be used at other resorts) and does have fees that are applicable on each booking.

Is this a good investment

We would describe these Units as perpetual unsecured debt (one that never has to be redeemed by Grand Medina Resorts and without any physical assets securing their value) with a maximum annual return of 10% in a development that is a start-up with no revenue. From the time of your investment till building is completed and profits are generated an investor is not assured any return on their investment i.e. you could be lending money with no return for several years. A debt instrument with nor minimum return, a capped return, and no security against the land and buildings is not something that interests us.

In Table 1, we show the cost of a 7-day vacation under several scenarios in both high and low season for a couple and a family of four with two children under 12 years of age (eligible for 50% discount). The numbers in red represent additional payments in US$ that would need to be paid by Partners Club members – 80% of combinations would require additional payments. In addition to the All-inclusive fee, transportation to and from the resort must be added including air fare and taxi.

If you found the idea of an investment that paid for your vacation compelling, keep reading. As always, consult your adviser as this is a hypothetical example.

In Table 2 we picked some regulated industries, without regard to sharia compliance, in which we see a possibility for future dividend and capital appreciation. All trade in US$ on the US exchange and payout dividends in US$ that can be used towards a US$ vacation. As the table shows, a 5% current rate of return can be had as of December 2018, with less risk than a development project as these are all heavily government regulated companies domiciled in Canada (remember they came out of the 2007/08 financial crisis healthy), and with capital and dividend appreciation opportunity. This may well be a safer route to building a vacation fund that provides for us a better risk-reward outcome.

We have come across halal vacations in which a resort is rented out exclusively to a Muslim tour operator, thus the novelty of the Grand Medina model is being duplicated at some level today without the investment requirement. We expect to see additional Muslim only destinations spring up across the Caribbean as additional tour operators start catering to the growing Muslim market. For us, keeping our money invested in a diversified portfolio of dividend producing equities backed with assets and with the potential for uncapped returns is the better investment option. With our returns we can always visit Grand Medina and other resorts.

If you have an investment you would like for us to evaluate, please email us at HalalJihadist@gmail.com

Welcome

noreply@blogger.com (Halal Jihadist) — Sun, 20 Jan 2019 05:38:00 +0000

Welcome to the Halal Jihadist where we hope to educate and turn a spotlight on the world of investing and food.

Our objective in publishing our thoughts is primarily to force rigor into our thoughts and share it with you. We have come across what we believe to be questionable definitions of halal and want to force ourselves to be just in on our evaluation and felt sharing our opinions in written form would do just that, as it would open us to your opinions.

Halal Meat
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So what is our beef [pun intended]? Halal meat and the certification agencies. Halal is more than the act of using a blade across the throat of an animal, but to all those who we spoke with in the certification business last year (2017) that is all they measured.

Sharia / Riba Investing
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We feel it is very important that we preserve and grow our wealth to ensure we can give Zakat to those in need. When we see faith based marketing schemes, and the re-papering of contracts in which 'interest' is crossed out and replaced with 'penalty fee' and than certified as Sharia compliant we are going to shine a light and evaluate the merits.

We hope through this dialogue we can all move closer to understanding and making informed choices.

The Halal Jihadist
HalalJihadist@gmail.com