Almost every bank in the modern world is built on the same foundation: interest. Savers deposit their money, banks lend it out at a higher rate, and the gap between the two is how the institution sustains itself. For most people, this is simply how banking works — as natural and unremarkable as gravity.

But for roughly 1.8 billion Muslims worldwide, the equation is not so simple. Islamic law is unambiguous on the matter of Riba the Arabic term for interest, or any guaranteed return on a loan declaring it forbidden. The concern is not merely technical. At its heart, the prohibition reflects a deeper ethical conviction: that money should not generate more money simply by sitting still, and that risk must be shared, not transferred entirely onto the borrower.