Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank, based in the United Arab Emirates, raised $800m for its first ever sukuk, an Islamic bond that complies with the Koran's ban on lending money for overt interest, with nearly 40 per cent of the investors coming from Europe. The five-year bond, structured to be shariah-compliant, offers a return equivalent to 40 basis points over London Interbank Offered Rate.

Emphasis added.

Overt.

Well, an admission in fact that interest charges are in there.

Of course the triumph of form over substance is probably useful to Muslims who have been duped into the dead-end narrow-minded literalism that reads the Quran's ban as on "all interest" but whose same narrow-minded literalism allows transparent work-arounds of form over-substance - above all with a cut for "sancitoning" by self-interested religious scholars.

I suppose if one deliberately wants to uselessly raise one's cost of doing business.....