Pomegra
UK Islamic fintech Ayan Capital secured a £75 million Shariah-compliant debt facility originated by Triple Point, its largest raise yet, as it prepares to file for a full UK banking licence.
Key Takeaways
- Triple Point originated the £75M ($100M) senior ijara-based facility, the largest Shariah-compliant financing Ayan has closed to date.
- Ayan plans to file a UK banking licence application and raise a Series A round in the coming months.
- Since launching in early 2024, over 150,000 people have started an application with the company, which holds a 4.9 Trustpilot rating.
Lead
Ayan Capital, the London-based Islamic fintech, announced on September 17, 2026 that it had secured a senior Shariah-compliant facility of up to £75 million ($100 million), originated by investment manager Triple Point. The deal marks the company's most significant external financing since it launched halal car finance in early 2024, and sets the stage for what its founders say will become a full-service halal digital bank in the UK.
What Does the Facility Actually Fund?
The money goes to work immediately on new originations. Structured as a senior ijara-based facility - a Shariah-compliant leasing arrangement that avoids interest by having Ayan buy and hold ownership of each vehicle throughout the contract term - the financing is meant to reduce Ayan's cost of funding and let it price its products more competitively against conventional car finance.
Under Ayan's Ijara wa Iqtina model, customers pay fixed monthly rentals and take ownership at the end of the term. The structure carries real ownership risk for Ayan: the company, not the customer, bears liability if a vehicle's value deteriorates unexpectedly. Shariah compliance is reviewed annually by independent advisers. An add-on called AyanCare also covers unexpected mechanical and electrical repairs, a feature designed to close the gap between halal finance and the convenience of mainstream consumer credit.
The facility replaces and significantly expands on a prior £25 million Shariah-compliant debt arrangement, suggesting Ayan has demonstrated enough repayment performance to justify a threefold increase in senior credit capacity.
Why Is a Car Finance Firm Applying for a Banking Licence?
The playbook is deliberate. Ayan's founding team - CEO Abdullo Kurbanov, alongside Firdavs Mirzoev and Zuhursho Rahmatulloev - previously built Alif, a fintech and banking group in Tajikistan that now serves more than 10 million customers across Central Asia. They ran the same sequence there: start with a high-demand consumer finance product, build credit history and regulatory credibility, then convert to a full bank.
In the UK, car finance is the entry point. The roadmap points toward halal current accounts, savings products, and cards once a banking licence is granted. Ayan received its FCA credit licence in October 2025 and is now preparing the more demanding application for a full deposit-taking licence - a process that typically takes 12 to 24 months from submission and requires substantial equity capital, not just debt.
To that end, Ayan has said it plans to raise a Series A equity round in the coming months, alongside the banking licence push. Existing equity backers include Cur8 Capital, Empakt Ventures, IT Park Ventures, and Caucasus VC.
The Market Case - and the Counterargument
Ayan puts the UK Muslim population's financial footprint at roughly $90 billion in bank deposits and $40 billion in annual financing. It cites internal research suggesting 85% of British Muslims would switch to halal products if the pricing were competitive. Those numbers, if accurate, represent a substantial addressable market that mainstream banks have been slow to serve systematically.
The counterargument is execution risk. The UK banking licence process is long, capital-intensive, and uncertain. Several challenger banks have spent years in the application queue without success. The gap between a well-functioning neofintech and a licensed deposit-taker is significant - regulatory capital requirements alone can reach hundreds of millions of pounds. Ayan's current metrics are encouraging: a sub-industry loss rate, strong conversion, and a growing application funnel. But strong consumer finance performance does not automatically translate into a viable deposit-taking bank.
Triple Point's decision to originate the facility provides a degree of external validation on credit quality, though debt originators and equity investors price risk differently.
Outlook
Ayan Capital's £75 million facility secures its near-term lending capacity and gives the company runway to pursue a banking licence without immediately diluting equity holders. The next 12 months will be defined by two parallel tracks: the Series A raise, which will signal what institutional equity investors think the business is worth, and progress on the banking licence application, which will determine whether Ayan's expansion ambitions are on schedule or under pressure. The halal digital banking space in the UK remains thin - Al Rayan Bank is the primary licensed incumbent - which gives Ayan a clear competitive lane if it can clear the regulatory hurdle.
