Sustainability Profile of Islamic Banking Industry: Evidence from World Top Five Islamic Banking Countries

The main purpose of this paper is to analyze the economic sustainability of Islamic banking industry in the top
five Islamic banking countries by global Islamic banking assets i.e. Iran, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Kuwait, and
U.A.E. This paper applied Altman model on the selected Islamic banks with the objective to evaluate their
economic sustainability, ANOVA and Regression tests are applied to examine the significance and correlations of
independent variables with bankruptcy. From the selected sample Saudi Arabian Islamic banks top the
sustainability profile list while Malaysian banks reserved the last place. The overall bankruptcy rate of Islamic
banks is recorded 53 per cent, while, Malaysian Islamic banks registered the highest bankruptcy rate of 89 per
cent, and Saudi Arabian banks retained the lowest bankruptcy rate of 29 per cent. Moreover profitability ratio is
found to be insignificant with sustainability exposure. The model used in this study required retained earnings,
while retained earnings is directly linked with the age of firm. However, majority of the Malaysian and Kuwaiti
Islamic banks are incorporated in mid 2000, the small age of these banks lead towards their lower or negative
retained earning, which ultimately reduced their sustainability rating in the evaluation process. The analysis here
is viable for drawing the attention of researchers and practitioners towards the deteriorated economic
sustainability of Islamic banking industry. This study also urge to develop a separate bankruptcy continuum
model for Islamic banking industry, therefore, this study will also serve as a launching pad in the process of
developing that model.