Crypto Firms Turn to Dubai as EU Grants Only 244 MiCA Licenses Ahead of Deadline

Crypto firms that failed to secure licenses under the European Union’s Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) regulation are increasingly considering expansion to the UAE, particularly Dubai. According to reports, only 244 out of nearly 3,000 crypto-asset service providers (CASPs) have obtained full MiCA licenses as the July 1 transition deadline approaches.

Lawyer Irina Heaver of NeosLegal in Dubai noted that her firm now receives over 120 inquiries per week from European companies and founders, driven by rising costs, timing issues, and uncertainty around MiCA licensing. “They’re looking to move themselves and their wealth and their ideas and their intellectual potential to a country that welcomes them,” she said.

Germany leads with 57 MiCA licenses, followed by France with 26, together accounting for more than one-third of all licenses issued. Conversely, Greece, Hungary, Poland, Portugal, and Romania have not yet issued any MiCA licenses. Among major crypto firms, Coinbase and Ripple have achieved MiCA compliance.

Several exchanges, including Binance, Bitget, and MEXC, are no longer authorized to serve EU users and have begun restricting trading and deposits. Binance faced difficulties after ECB President Christine Lagarde reportedly blocked its license in Greece, though the exchange is now seeking a license in France. Bybit has also started limiting services for EEA users as part of its regulatory alignment.

Meanwhile, Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA) has issued its 50th crypto license, the latest awarded to tokenized assets platform Tribe Tokenisation. In a related development, Securitize received approval for a SPAC merger and will list on the NYSE under the ticker ‘SECZ’, becoming the first publicly traded tokenization platform.

Source: https://coingape.com/crypto-firms-turn-dubai-eu-grants-only-244-mica-licenses-ahead-of-deadline/