Improving Public Debt Management
In the OIC Member Countries
62
fourth quarter of 2015 (Fitch Ratings 2016). Overall, international Sukuk issuance amounted to
about 34.4% of total sukuk issuance ($20,88 billion) while the domestic Sukuk issuance
amounted to 65.6% of total sukuk issuance ($39,81 billion) in 2015 (see upper left panel of
Figure 318).
The lower left panel of Figure 318 shows the breakdown of sukuk issuance by whether the
issuer is a sovereign, a quasisovereign (e.g., Islamic Development Bank, International Islamic
Liquidity Management, World Bank) or a corporation. Sukuk issuances by sovereigns and
quasisovereigns have mainly caused the strong increase in sukuk issuance since 2008 (IIFM
2016). The sukuk market has shown to be quite stable between 1990 and 2014 with a default
rate of only 0.6%. The reason for this resilience could be their assetbacked structure, as well
as the fact that since the 2000s around 80% of sukuk bonds are issued by governments
(COMCEC 2016a, World Bank 2012).
The upper right panel of Figure 318 shows how outstanding sukuk has increased since 2003.
In 2015, total sukuk outstanding have reached $321 billion. About 28.2% of total sukuk outstanding is international ($90 billion) and 71.8% is domestic ($231 billion). The
breakdown between sovereign/quasisovereign and corporate outstanding sukuk is about
fiftyfifty (see lower right panel of Figure 318).