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Ihilal.com serves a Muslim financial market estimated to be worth as much as $250 billion

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (CNN) -- For many of the world's estimated 1.5 billion Muslims, Islam is more than a religion -- it's a creed that governs every aspect of life, including business.

iHilal.com is an Islamic financial Web site dedicated to serving that Muslim market, which could be worth up to $250 billion by some estimates.

At the moment, most of the interest in iHilal.com comes from the United States, where the largest number of Muslims regularly go online. But increasingly, the Web site aims to cultivate interest from the Middle East, perhaps its natural home.

"This part of the world, although the Internet penetration is not as high as in the West, it's growing at incredible rates ... like 50 percent a year," says Ramzi Abukhadra, CEO of iHilal.com. "So as the Internet penetrates more and more to this part of the world, we are going to get market share in this part, and we (will) grow with it."

Islamic investing is a complicated business based on Islamic ethics called Shari'ah. Those ethics prohibit money going into companies involved in alcohol or gambling, for example. Also excluded are companies that make profits from interest payments, such as banks and insurance groups.

That means 16 of the 30 stocks on Wall Street's Dow Jones Industrial Average fall outside Shari'ah.

"ihilal and Islamic investment interprets core ethical and religious principles in a modern way," says Ali Al Shihabi, founder and chairman of iHilal.com. "I think generally in Islam today, there's a tremendous need for modern practical interpretations to come out to allow the Muslim to operate in the modern world. And I think Islamic finance has been on the cutting edge of that."

Zouheir El Jarkass has been investing for five years and says Islamic investing brings peace of mind -- even if it cuts profits.

"I might be missing (out) on something, but the good feeling I get from investing Islamically far outweighs any return that I might be avoiding," he says. "So far, I really have not missed on anything. And when you invest with a good feeling, you don't really care about how much extra you might be making -- if any -- if you didn't invest Islamically."

The principles of Islamic finance have been around for hundreds of years. But new access to information has given Muslims here and around the world more choice to decide exactly how they will spend their money.

"For us, access to Web sites and to the Internet has opened so many doors for us," says Husam Hourani of Al Hamimi & Co. "It has provided us a wealth of information that was not available to us or previous generations. It's something we are very grateful for, and something that has advanced our knowledge and experience in many aspects, including Islamic finance."

The Web has done more than just create a form for investing. Many say it has allowed a way for Islam to be relevant in the modern world -- and show that the practical, the philosophical and the religious can co-exist.

Financial Site Serves Islamic Market
iHilal.com helps Muslims make investments based on Islamic ethics called Shari'ah

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