M Kabir Hassan

A Bangladesh–Malaysia free trade agreement is not just a bilateral deal. It is the first brick of SEACO — the five-country building block that could finally give the OIC's common-market rhetoric something to stand on.

Every once in a while, a document comes along that forces us to rethink the boundaries of what we believe is possible.

 A blueprint for building Islamic banking on qard hasan, waqf, and Islamic values.

This week marked another milestone for Islamic finance in Bangladesh.

A mature democracy needs an opposition that responds to the budget with serious governing alternatives, not merely louder criticism.

Islamic banking must abandon conventional debt-based structures and instead embrace genuine equity financing to achieve ethical compliance.

Bangladesh’s capital market remains one of the weakest components in its financial architecture. After independence, formal trading on the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) started in 1976.

Money-printing, or monetary expansion, is often described in a way that makes it sound as if the government runs a printing press.

Bangladesh produces a significant share of the world’s raw leather, yet captures only a small fraction of the global leather goods trade.

Bangladesh is preparing its next national budget at a difficult moment when living costs remain high, private investment is weak, foreign exchange reserves are under pressure, development needs exceed domestic revenue, and a growing share of public expenditure is absorbed by debt servicing.

Takaful or cooperative Islamic insurance can serve as an ethical alternative to conventional insurance.

Empirical data confirms the ongoing trend. According to figures released by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the US dollar’s share of foreign currency reserves decreased from roughly 71 percent in 1999 to around 57 percent by the end of 2025, the lowest level recorded in the last 30 years.

However, a new agreement could involve greater scrutiny and more severe structural targets, thus leaving Bangladesh with less flexibility for policymaking.

On April 10 this year, the parliament approved a legislative amendment to the Bank Resolution Act, 2026, which may undo months of banking reform and painful adjustments. Under the revised act, former owners of troubled banks, including those who mishandled their respective institutions to the point of insolvency, may acquire the same institutions again by paying less than 7.5 percent of the amounts previously provided by the government and central bank.

After 22 months of invasion, let’s evaluate whether it was worth it or not for Russia to invade Ukraine.

The significance of the US debt in the global economy is crucial, as it frequently serves as a benchmark for returns on stocks and other bonds.

China's proposed policy measures seem like a smart move.

The reality is that the Paris summit ended without any major announcements.