MSCI

MSCI Inc.

DOUBTFUL — SCREEN DOES NOT PASSstock

Is MSCI Halal?

Financial data and indices facilitate conventional finance and the debt screen fails.

What You Should Know

MSCI's March 31, 2026 filing shows debt/assets of 116.31%, above the examined FTSE, MSCI and Malaysia limits; liquidity/assets is 6.95%, receivables plus cash/assets is 22.88% and disclosed interest income/revenue is 0.33%. Index licensing, bond data and portfolio analytics serve both permissible and conventional mandates, so the activity conclusion remains methodology-dependent.

⚠️ Concerns

  • Debt/assets materially exceeds the examined financial limits
  • Bond and fixed-income indexes can facilitate riba-based finance
  • Index and analytics revenue is not allocated by client mandate or prohibited activity
  • Data, model-risk, governance and private-assets products require review

Current quantitative Sharia screen

Based on 10-Q figures for the period ended 2026-03-31; calculated 2026-07-14.

USD · millions
Interest-bearing debt / assets
116.31%Above limit
Below 33.333% under FTSE Yasaar

6,450 / 5,545.3

Cash + interest-bearing securities / assets
6.95%Within limit
Below 33.333% under FTSE Yasaar

385.3 / 5,545.3

Receivables + cash / assets
22.88%Within limit
Below 50% under FTSE Yasaar

1,268.5 / 5,545.3

Non-compliant income / revenue
0.33%Within limit
No more than 5% under FTSE Yasaar

2.8 / 850.8

FTSE Yasaar
v4.6, February 2026
Financial
Fails
Overall
Fails

Debt/assets is 116.31%, above the examined FTSE 33.333% limit; liquidity/assets is 6.95%, receivables plus cash/assets is 22.88% and interest income/revenue is 0.33%.

MSCI Islamic (total-assets series)
October 2024 methodology
Financial
Fails
Overall
Fails

Debt/assets is 116.31%, above the examined MSCI 33.33% total-assets limit; the debt failure is independent of business-activity classification.

Malaysia SAC financial ratios
single 5% activity benchmark adopted November 2025
Financial
Fails
Overall
Fails

Debt/assets is 116.31%, above the examined Malaysia 33% limit; this is a calculation against the named ratios, not an official classification.

Market-cap denominator methods
MSCI M-Series, S&P and Dow Jones methods differ
Financial
Not calculated
Overall
Fails

A licensed historical market-cap series is not stored; the debt screen fails independently.

Business-activity disclosure

MSCI provides indexes, portfolio analytics, ESG and private-assets data, risk models and research used by institutional investors. The data and analytics activity is generally a service business, but bond indexes and tools that facilitate conventional finance raise riba and facilitation questions requiring methodology-specific review.

Limitation: The filing does not allocate revenue into a universal prohibited-activity numerator for bond-index licensing, conventional portfolio analytics, risk tools and other finance-facilitation services.

Purification

MSCI discloses $2.8 million of interest income but does not prescribe a scholar-approved purification percentage; the disclosed ratio is evidence for the income screen, not a complete purification prescription.

Inputs, assumptions and primary sources
  • Amounts are USD millions from MSCI's March 31, 2026 Form 10-Q and rounded to one decimal where reported.
  • Debt uses total debt of $6,450.0 million, including $6,403.8 million of long-term debt and current debt obligations; operating leases are excluded.
  • Cash and cash equivalents including restricted cash are $385.3 million; no separately identified interest-bearing securities balance is added.
  • Receivables are $883.2 million and first-quarter operating revenues are $850.8 million; interest income is $2.8 million.

This is a reproducible financial screen, not a fatwa. A failed total-assets screen can coexist with a pass under a market-cap methodology. ZakatInvest keeps the qualitative assessment separate so numerical thresholds do not erase material context.

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