BitCoin and home insurance

Question

Salaam,

How are you? I hope you’re doing well. I have a couple of questions that I was hoping you might be able to answer for me:

1) Have you heard of BitCoin? Is it a halal investment option?

2) Is home insurance permissible? My assumption is no, but you know what they say about assuming. 

JazakAllah for your time!

Answer

 بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

الجواب حامدا ومصليا ومسلما

 

The answers to your queries may be found below:

  1. According to our research, Bitcoin is a virtual currency which is bought online and commonly used for money transfers. We are not aware of any reason why it would not be a halal investment option. However, since the concept of virtual currency is relatively new and is currently being further researched by many ‘ulama, we would advise to refrain from investing in it until further research takes place.

  1.  In principle, home insurance is impermissible due to interest and gambling. Interest is charged for late payment fees. As for gambling, since there is no guarantee that you will receive your money back at all or if you will even receive any service at all, such a transaction would fall under the ruling of gambling in shari’ah.

Allah Ta’ala has mentioned in the Quran:

 

إنما الخمر والميسر والأنصاب والأزلام رجس من عمل الشيطان 

“Indeed wine, gambling, altar stones, and divining arrows are filth and a work of the devil.”

(al-Maidah:90) 

However, if such an insurance policy is a requirement of the country of one’s residence, it would be permissible in that scenario due to necessity.

Likewise, there also may be scope for permissibility in certain cases for those who live in such conditions or areas that they could wrongfully be made liable for damages incurred on their property. In either case, one should not buy more insurance than needed.

والله اعلم

Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala knows best.

Taha Abdulkareem 

Approved by Mufti Husain Ahmad Madani