FRANKFURT, Oct 29 (Reuters) - Germany wants to establish itself as a market for financial products that conform with Islamic law, the head of German financial regulator said on Thursday.
"We are seeing great interest from investors in Islamic countries, who want to invest their money in Germany according to sharia principles," Bafin president Jochen Sanio said at a conference on Islamic finance in Frankfurt.
Sharia, or Islamic law, requires investments to be based on a specific asset and bans excessive speculation, interest-based lending and gambling, alcohol and pornography-related activities.
Germany makes it easy to obtain a licence to sell the products, which are also compatible with the country's financial rules.
"We hope to soon welcome the first interested party that wants to start offering these products," Sanio said.
Though no financial institution has made the move so far, Germany's 4.3 million Muslims, mainly from Turkey, represent a market with bigger potential than in any other European country.
Islamic finance is already a growth market in many other European countries, in particular the United Kingdom.
France is also striving to position itself as a European hub for the practice.
Islamic finance dates back to the 1960s but began to take off in the mid-1990s. There are now about $700 billion in assets under sharia-compliant management, with growth rates of 15-20 percent per year, Sanio said.
Germany's financial power houses such as Deutsche Bank and insurer Allianz already offer sharia-compliant products in Muslim countries.