Duncan Smith
Duncan, the Chairman of Tejara Capital was, until mid-2020, the CEO of the firm. He also held the position of a Senior Executive Officer of Tejara Capital International Limited in Dubai and was a founding member of Tejara Capital in 2008. He brings considerable experience to the Tejara Capital management team, having spent much of his career establishing and managing Islamic banking, investment and asset management businesses with leading institutions in the field.
After leaving Barclays in 1985, he started Saudi International Bank’s trade and commodity investment activities where he established the first Sharia-compliant trade fund. Since then, Duncan has been responsible for launching and running investment portfolios and funds across a range of institutions. This has included, facilitating the investment of several billions of dollars by leading Islamic and conventional Banks in the Gulf, family offices and corporates in currencies, commodities, equipment leasing, equity and debt for real estate and REITs in the UK and US. In the 1990s Duncan managed the introduction of Islamic home finance programmes in UK and USA and between 2004 and 2008, as Senior Vice President at Arab Banking Corporation, Bahrain, he oversaw the design and execution of the early cutting-edge corporate Sukuk, project financing syndication and hedging products.
He holds an M.A. degree from the University of Cambridge.