After a comparatively slow start in the crypto asset space – at least compared with some of its near neighbours in the Middle East – Dubai made headlines in early February 2022 with the birth of the Virtual Asset Regulatory Authority (Vara), a body described as the world’s first independent regulator for virtual assets.
At a time when bitcoin was worth around $42,000 and crypto firms spent lavishly on advertising for the Super Bowl, Vara and Dubai welcomed the industry’s largest names, granting several high-profile minimal viable product (MVP) licences to the likes of Binance, FTX (subsequently withdrawn in November), Crypto.com, OKX and others, even as its rulebook was still being written.
