When Facebook went public on May 18, for the handful of venture capitalists, Accel Partners, Greylock Partners and Meritech Capital, who have been with the company since its early days, it was a massive financial payoff. With the IPO also came fame and reputation. At a closing price of $38.23, Facebook's market value is nearly $105 billion, creating huge paper gains for scores of early insiders and hundreds of employees.

Venture capitalist Accel Partners, which initially invested $12.7 million in Facebook at a $98 million valuation back in 2005, the year after it was founded, is clearly the big winner. With the IPO, the current stake of Accel and its affiliates will be worth $6.3 billion, assuming a mid-point stock price of $31.50.

Islamic banking and financial services have been enjoying a major resurgence in recent years. A survey released in 2009 by The Banker magazine found that assets held by Sharia-compliant banks rose 28.6 per cent in 2009 to $822 billion, while assets held by conventional banks grew only 6.8 per cent. However, Islamic finance still accounts for only about 1 per cent of the global financial-services market, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Analysts predict that the Islamic mortgage market in the West will grow substantially over the next five years. In the United Kingdom, Islamic mortgages were identified as an important emerging niche sector. Two large multinational banks, United National Bank and HSBC, joined the Ahli United Bank in offering Islamic mortgage products.