Dubai and its sibling hub Abu Dhabi were rated tops in the regulatory structure, the most heavily weighted criterion at 35% of the total score, according to CoinDesk’s Crypto Hubs 2023. Despite the low overall drivers category score, Dubai cemented its place in the top five with high scores in the opportunities category, which measured per-capita crypto events, companies, and jobs.
The biggest names in crypto seem to be gravitating to Dubai, the largest city in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Binance co-founders Changpeng CZ Zhao and He Yi have made it their home, Coinbase’s Brian Armstrong has met with its regulators, and Wazirx, one of India’s largest exchanges, is moving its headquarters there. It seems Dubai’s master plan to enter the top echelon of global financial centers, joining New York, London, and Hong Kong, is working.
Dubai has been growing as a business and financial services hub for the Middle East over the last few decades by embracing innovation. In 2014, the local government engaged IBM to advise it on new technologies, and six years later, in March 2022, Dubai established the Virtual Asset Regulatory Authority (VARA), the world’s first independent crypto regulator.
As the crypto industry’s demands for clear regulation in the United States are met with a slew of lawsuits from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the UAE has emerged as a viable alternative. It’s unfortunate, the U.S.’s current position on the [crypto] space, Bader Al Kalooti, executive director of Binance MENA, told journalists. But that doesn’t mean that the rest of the world isn’t open to crypto. And Dubai and other markets in Asia have opened the doors.
According to the Dubai Statistics Center, as of 2022, over 3.2 million of the Emirate’s total ~3.5 million population is non-Emirati, making it a melting pot of people as Al Kalooti explained. With such a diverse population, blockchain technology has numerous use cases in the city, ranging from remittances for those working in Dubai and sending money home or facilitating the flight of capital for those taking refuge from unstable economies.
What makes Dubai and the United Arab Emirates unique as a crypto hub is that it offers a home for all those types of use cases, Al Kalooti said. Shortly after establishing VARA, the government unveiled the Dubai Metaverse Strategy and its intention to create one of the world’s top 10 metaverse economies as well as a global hub for the metaverse community. The country aims to attract 1,000 blockchain and metaverse companies and create 40,000 virtual jobs by 2030.
Situated in proximity to Northern Africa, Asia, and Europe, Dubai is not just a travel destination for those seeking a beach vacation, but also fosters global networking and collaboration. The city is the host of GITEX (Gulf Information Technology Exhibition), a leading tech conference featuring blockchain and Web3 as two of its 18 focus areas, that, according to local reporting, had 170,000 attendees in 2022. There is no shortage of crypto events in Dubai, including Binance Blockchain Week and Dubai Fintech Week.
After leaving IBM, Saqr Ereiqat co-founded Dubai-based Crypto Oasis, which develops blockchain ecosystems modeled after the Crypto Valley in Zug, Switzerland, the No. 1 spot in CoinDesk’s Crypto Hubs 2023. For those looking to build a team in Dubai, Ereiqat said, the UAE’s most unique element is the access to talent […] within three hours you have access to three billion people.
Dubai is emerging as a major crypto hub, ranking in CoinDesk’s Crypto Hubs 2023. The city-state was rated tops in the regulatory structure, the most heavily weighted criterion at 35% of the total score. It also achieved the second-highest quality of life score in the sample, and has a diverse population with numerous use cases for blockchain technology. Dubai is the host of GITEX, a leading tech conference featuring blockchain and Web3, and is home to numerous crypto events such as Binance Blockchain Week and Dubai Fintech Week. With its access to talent and its commitment to innovation, Dubai is becoming a major player in the crypto space.