FinFormed

Critical Financial Insights for Future Leaders

Sign in Support
FinFormed 01 Nov 2026 01 Nov 2026
To
Future Leaders
From
Erfanul Alam Siddiquee
Posted

Dear Aisha, The Bank Wanted You First

In 1992, Malaysian banks gave children story books for keeping money in the bank. A father's letter on what has changed, what has not, and what Islamic finance sees in the gift.

Read the letter
5 min readIslamic Finance

Earlier letters

  1. Islamic Finance Talent and the Habit We Forgot We Had
  2. Should Bangladesh Borrow From Wall Street Before It Borrows From Itself?
  3. Who Else Is Watching the Names on a Sukuk Board?
  4. A Journal Says Famous Scholars Lower Sukuk Returns. I am Not Convinced.
  5. Islamic Finance in Sri Lanka That Never Say "Islamic"
Older letters

Letters, newest first

  1. Who Are You Running For? Live Like a Traveller Did you get a good break, or did your body rest while your mind kept running? A letter on who we run for, what the grave keeps, and the hadith that tells us to live like a traveller. 3 min read · Random Writings
  2. Why the Takaful Fund Has No Capital of Its Own? Suppose you know a shopkeeper in your area. He runs a small electrical goods store and pays 40,000 a year into a Takaful 6 min read · Islamic Finance
  3. Why Islamic Banks Lend Like Conventional Banks? Why do Islamic banks rely on murabahah, not profit sharing? The cause is an information problem, and tax e-invoicing data could fix it. 7 min read · Islamic Finance
  4. Your insurer knows your blood group. It has never once used that to help you find blood I was holding a fresh bag of blood when my father took his last breath. That scene came back to me today while I 3 min read · Islamic Finance
  5. Some Days I Think About Giving Up on Islamic Finance I need to remind myself why I am here. I came into Islamic finance because I believed it could be better than what I 2 min read · Islamic Finance
  6. The mathematics of trust in Islamic financial systems Artificial intelligence (AI) cannot fix broken financial systems. Read why returning to community-based trust and patient capital prevents economic collapse. 4 min read · Islamic Finance

Topics

Islamic Finance104 letters Conventional Finance91 letters Random Writings31 letters Technology18 letters Career15 letters Takaful15 letters Climate Change12 letters Financial Freedom5 letters Sustainability2 letters

Get each letter by email

Free. Every new letter arrives in your inbox; unsubscribe from any email.

Check your inbox: there is a link to confirm.

That did not work. Please check the address and try again.

Or keep FinFormed going:

Become a member, $5 a month Send a coffee