Dubai-based Noor Islamic Bank has launched two capital-protected structured products offering investors exposure to precious metals, currencies, equities, energy and agricultural commodities.

"We do not recognise that clients need to compromise on their investments because they want them to be Shari'ah-compliant," said Hussain AlQemzi, CEO at Noor Investment Group and Noor Islamic Bank. "These two products fill a gap in the Shari'ah-compliant investment space and provide clients [with] the opportunity to benefit from the upside of investment cycles."

The Hybrid Pick and Drop Structure is a three-year investment targeting investors with a conservative to moderate risk profile seeking exposure to a diverse range of asset classes, with the best performing asset class being picked and dropped from further calculations every six months.

For the more moderate and aggressive investors, the bank is marketing the GCC Volatility Cap structure, a product providing access to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) markets without downside risk through a portfolio of underlying stocks across different markets and sectors.

John Chang, head of retail banking at Noor said: "This product is unique in the way that it tracks the volatility of the underlying equities basket. If the set benchmark is breached, the exposure to equities is trimmed and moved to Murabaha-equivalent investments."