ARI HICoE's Research Niche in Islamic Financial Criminology

When the Accounting Research Institute was accorded the higher institutions' centre of excellence (HICoE) status in 2010 by the Ministry of Higher Education Ministry Malaysia, it was entrusted to drive a niche research area in Islamic Financial Criminology (IFC).  Fundamentally, IFC comprises three basic research areas: (i) research related to developing new or innovating existing Islamic Finance Products; (ii) research to strengthen the governance and integrity of the Islamic finance sector and (iii) research to mitigate financial leakages in organisations, including the Islamic Finance sector. The main aim of the IFC research agenda is to establish a sustainable Islamic Finance sector for Malaysia and possibly globally. In driving the new knowledge corpus in Islamic Financial Criminology, ARI divides its research program into four main clusters: (1) Governance & Shariah Compliance; (2) Corporate Integrity System & Ethics; (3) Anti-Money Laundering & Mitigation; and (4) Methodologies in Financial Fraud Detection & Investigation.  In 2017, we will include another research project - Decision Support System- to integrate all these clusters. 

FRGS Projects 2015

The Accounting Research Institute congratulates all researchers who have successfully secured the Fundamental Research Grants either as Principal Investigators or co-researchers.  ARI have forged smart partnerships with four faculties namely (i) Faculty of Accountancy, (ii) Faculty of Business Management, (iii) Faculty of Law and (iv) Faculty of Information Management.  Congratulations all.  For the FRGS -1 2015 listing, ARI researchers are involved in the following projects:

Global Islamic Finance Awards

Global Islamic Finance Awards (GIFA) are the first of their kind of awards and emerged as the most respectable market-led awards in Islamic banking and finance. GIFA is based on an objective proprietary methodology developed by Edbiz Consulting.  These awards recognize and celebrate success and contributions of individuals and institutions in the Islamic financial services Industry. The objective of GIFA is to highlight the best practices in Islamic banking and finance and celebrate success of governments, institutions and individuals in Islamic banking and finance, with an ultimate objective of promoting social responsibility, adherence to Shari’a authenticity and commitment to Islamic banking and finance.  Each year, GIFA nominations are announced in the first and second quarter and remain open till the end of the second quarter of the year. The nominees are requested to send in relevant documents, highlighting their performance, objectives in line with GIFA. 

This is followed by detailed independent research work by the GIFA team and deliberations of the GIFA awards committee before the winners are announced.  The GIFA Awards Committee attempts to ensure complete transparency in terms of the following: (i) Innovation - those products and services will be rewarded, which contribute to the growth of Islamic finance through innovative applications and Shariah principles; (ii) Quantity and Quality - the breadth and depth of product/service offerings and where applicable, performance data are taken into account when assessing the performance of the nominated institutions and individuals during the award period; (iii) Cross Border - Provision of products/services that take on an international dimension outside of the established home market is a major criterion for selection of nominations and (iv) Promotion of the Growth of the Industry - Products/services that have established standards of best practices for the national markets and global Islamic financial services industry are also treated over and above other products.

HICoE Strategic Direction

The Higher Institutions' Centre of Excellence or HICoE is an initiative mooted by the Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia in 2008 with the aim of recognising centres of excellence from various public universities so that they can spearhead their niche research agenda to higher international levels.  The six HICoEs recognized during the 2009 evaluation and their respective niche are namely (i) UM Centre of Research for Power Electronics, Drives, Automation & Control (UMPEDAC) - Renewable Energy; (ii) UKM Medical Molecular Biology Institute (UMBI) - Cancer Biomarkers; (iii) USM Institute for Research in Molecular Medicine (INFORMM) - Diagnostics Platforms; (iv) UPM Institute of Bioscience (IBS) - Animal Vaccines and Therapeutic; (v) USM Centre for Drug Research (CDR) - Behavioural Research in Addiction and UiTM Accounting Research Institute (ARI) - Islamic Financial Criminology.  Recently, all six HICoEs were called by the Ministry of Higher Education to present their strategic planning and strategic action towards becoming global reference centres within the next three years.  ARI presented its four research clusters namely (i) Islamic-based  Business Model  in Enhancing Good Governance and Wealth Creation, (ii) Corporate Integrity, Ethics and Risk Management, (iii) Anti-Money Laundering Mechanisms to Mitigate Financial Leakages and (iv) Methodologies in Financial Fraud Detection and Prevention. ARI's research in Islamic Financial Criminology has gained prominence globally as evidenced by it winning the Global Islamic Finance Awards (GIFA) for two consecutive years in 2014 & 2015.