What you need to know about Islamic social finance
Finance for social good
Islamic finance was designed at the birth of Islam to balance the wealth in society and to stop economic exploitation. Also known as shariah-compliant finance and economics, the extensive, sophisticated system only exists in Islam.
Islamic finance aims to improve social justice through wealth redistribution and fair financial dealings.
Focused on achieving common good, Islamic social finance bans exploitative practices like:
financial speculation, known in Arabic as maysir (investing at great risk in the hope that it will gain value)
interest, riba (mainly selling money but also goods at a higher price than their worth)
contractual ambiguity, gharar (financial deals with small print that could mean weaker parties are exploited).