The UAE’s virtual asset regulator has said that no crypto entity has received the full market product (FMP) license. According to the country’s Minister of State for Artificial Intelligence and Digital Economy, Omar Sultan Al Olama, no crypto entity has been able to “onboard any customer, even last week.”
VARA has yet to license a full market product
The UAE’s virtual assets regulator, the Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA), has not issued any operating licenses to date, the country’s digital economy minister Omar Sultan Al Olama said. Speaking at the World Economic Forum (WEF), Al Olama said that no crypto exchange entity, including Binance and FTX, has received the Full Market Product (FMP) license.
According to Al Olama’s comments published At Laraontheblock, no crypto has yet to complete VARA’s four-step process. Consequently, this means that “no one was able to onboard any customers even last week.”
In March 2022, VARA said it had granted Binance a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) license allowing it to offer an approved range of virtual asset-related services to suitably qualified retail and institutional investors in Dubai. Similar licenses have also been issued to other crypto exchange platforms. Apparently some crypto exchanges have used these licenses when promoting their credentials to potential clients.
However, VARA has now clarified that the licenses issued to Binance and other crypto exchanges are only “Provisional” at stage one, or “MVP-Preparatory” at stage two.
VASPs are not authorized to offer services to mass retail consumers
According to VARA, these licenses are only issued to allow Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) to meet the preconditions and start preparing. The regulator also reiterated Al Olama’s position that no crypto entity has received the full license.
“To date, no VARA licensee has received an MVP operating permit to provide regulated services or activities to its specifically authorized market segment(s) in the emirate. Any information or representation to the contrary is inaccurate and misleading”, the regulator clarified in a notification to the market in its website.
Echoing Al Olama’s message to the WEF, the regulator said MVP licensees cannot offer their services to mass retail consumers “until Stage Gate (4) FMP license approval has been obtained.”
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