Rafiza Ghazali, Managing Director, Consumer Banking at Fasset, explains how stablecoin-based settlement, tokenised real-world assets, and embedded Shariah governance are shaping the next phase of Islamic finance.
Islamic digital banking is entering a new phase as financial institutions explore how emerging technologies such as blockchain, stablecoins, and tokenisation can support more transparent and scalable financial systems while remaining aligned with Shariah principles. Fasset is among the companies seeking to bridge this gap by embedding compliance and governance directly into its digital infrastructure.
Rafiza Ghazali, Managing Director, Consumer Banking, Fasset, speaks with Sandhya D’Mello, Technology Editor, CPI Media Group, about how the company is approaching the evolution of Islamic digital banking. The discussion covers the regulatory, technological, and operational considerations for building a stablecoin-based Islamic banking platform, the lessons emerging from Malaysia’s digital banking model, and the roles that governance, transparency, and technology will play in strengthening trust across the global Islamic finance ecosystem.
Interview Excerpts:
How is Fasset redefining Islamic digital banking beyond traditional Shariah compliance?
Traditional Islamic banking often treats Shariah compliance as a product-level validation step applied after structuring. At Fasset, we embed Shariah into the banking infrastructure itself: the rails, ledgers, and controls are designed from the outset to exclude interest-based mechanics and enforce permitted uses of funds. Our stablecoin-based settlement layer provides continuous visibility into cash flows and the backing of reserves or assets, reducing ambiguity and strengthening traceability. This enables real-time Shariah governance across payments, treasury activity, and investment deployment, with rule-based controls that can prevent non-compliant routing, flag interest-linked payment components, and maintain auditable evidence for ongoing oversight. Coupled with this, our tokenised products are structured around real-world utility, ensuring assets remain linked to tangible value. By embedding compliance across more than 50 banking corridors, Fasset supports cross-border scale without weakening ethical or regulatory standards, creating the foundations to serve markets of up to 2.5 billion global users.
What were the key regulatory, Shariah, and technology challenges in building a stablecoin-based Islamic bank?
On the regulatory front, the central challenge was translating the speed of blockchain into controls that meet bank-grade expectations. Supervisors are primarily concerned with the ability to demonstrate consistent fiscal discipline over time. This required clear accountability for customer funds, rigorous reconciliation processes, resilient incident response, and well-defined governance over third-party dependencies — supported by auditability that withstands sustained scrutiny. From a Shariah perspective, the challenge was fundamentally operational. The real test lies in ensuring that product behavior, customer disclosures, and exception handling remain faithful to Islamic principles across every edge case. Technologically, this required integrating modern blockchain rails into traditional banking expectations while maintaining reliability, security, and predictable outcomes at scale.
From your experience, what differentiates digital banks that successfully scale from those that struggle?
Digital banks that successfully scale are the ones that intuitively solve real, everyday customer pain points. They focus on simple onboarding, a clear value proposition, and a product people use effortlessly and repeatedly without being “pushed.” The winners, especially given that they are new to the markets, make an effort to build trust through reliable service and strong risk controls, and grow through clear benefits rather than short-term campaigns.
“Digital banks that struggle usually overcomplicate the experience and lack clear value. As a result, they struggle to retain users who sign up but don’t remain active, making growth costly and difficult to sustain.”
How can Malaysia’s Islamic digital banking model influence markets in the GCC and wider emerging economies?
Malaysia is a prime example of how digital Islamic banking can gain traction when modern technology is paired with strong regulatory and Shariah foundations. The licensing of AEON Bank as a fully Islamic digital bank, alongside incumbents like Bank Islam launching digital-first platforms such as Be U, demonstrates how new and established players can modernise without diluting supervisory or Shariah standards. For regulators advancing digital assets and tokenisation agendas, this exemplifies how digital delivery and institutional trust can evolve together. Malaysia, therefore, offers a practical reference for markets looking to modernise financial systems; early regulatory engagement combined with disciplined execution creates durable foundations for growth.
What will be the biggest driver of trust in Islamic finance: governance, transparency, or technology?
Governance is the foundational driver of trust, shaping how systems behave as they scale. At Fasset, we now process more than US$12 billion in annualised transaction volume and serve an institutional user base that grew tenfold in 2025. Operating at this level demands consistent approaches to risk structuring and decision-making. This same discipline has guided strategic decisions such as our acquisition of DAO PropTech, which added proven real-world asset tokenisation capabilities to the platform. While technology delivers reach and velocity, governance ultimately determines whether scale strengthens confidence or introduces fragility. Nowhere is this more evident than in Islamic finance, where trust is built through repeatable, principled execution over time.
