Robinhood gets Dubai’s DFSA authorization for crypto and stock trading, but its 2027 launch has no country list

Robinhood said on Thursday 22 October that it has received authorization from the Dubai Financial Services Authority (DFSA) to bring its retail investing platform to the Middle East from the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC). According to the company’s release, the new unit, Robinhood MENA, will offer trading and custody across all ten asset classes the DFSA approves, crypto and stocks among them, with the product suite planned for 2027.

The DIFC becomes Robinhood’s regional headquarters. The release gives no list of countries, no prices and no launch month. The DFSA’s public register fills in part of the rest: its entry for Robinhood MENA Limited shows a licence dated 20 July 2026, an endorsement to serve retail clients, and two permitted activities, arranging deals and arranging custody. So for anyone typing “Robinhood Dubai license” into a search bar this week, the short answer is that the licence exists on paper, and that nobody outside the company can yet open an account.

One naming point. This is not a VARA licence. VARA, the Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority, is the Dubai body that Bybit says licensed it on the same day; Robinhood’s authorization comes from the DFSA, the financial regulator of the DIFC.

What the DFSA authorization covers, and what it does not

The release lists the scope in one line: trading and custody across the DFSA’s ten approved asset classes, including equities, crypto, exchange-traded funds and investment tokens. Only those four are named in the release. The DFSA register lists ten instrument types against both of the firm’s activities: certificates, debentures, futures, options, shares, structured products, warrants, units, investment tokens and crypto tokens.

Robinhood describes the service as retail. The release opens on its “retail investing platform”, Kerbrat speaks of retail investors across the MENA region, and the register carries the endorsement for financial services “with or for Retail Clients”. Who those clients will be is not stated, and the release never uses the phrase “eligible investors”; Bitcoin Magazine raised how they will be defined as the open point that decides the size of the market. The release talks about the Middle East and the MENA region in general, and its forward-looking statements refer to a planned expansion into the United Arab Emirates. It does not say which other countries, if any, will be served from Dubai, and it does not say whether a resident of Riyadh or Cairo will be able to sign up.

Pricing is missing as well. The Dubai release gives no fee schedule, a gap Bitcoin Magazine also noted.

Custody raises a further question. Robinhood owns two crypto businesses that could in theory hold client coins for a Middle East platform: Robinhood Crypto and Bitstamp, the exchange it bought in 2025. The register adds a clue. Robinhood MENA may arrange custody and arrange deals; it does not show the separate permissions to deal in investments or to provide custody itself. That points to another firm executing orders and holding assets, and neither the release nor the register names it.

Is it a Robinhood Dubai license? The wording question

Robinhood’s own word is “authorization”. Finance Magnates writes that the company “received approval”, while Bitcoin Magazine puts “license” in its headline. The register settles part of it: under “Date of Licence” it shows 20 July 2026 for Robinhood MENA Limited, a DIFC company with reference F012264, three months before the announcement. In the DFSA system a firm is licensed for a set of permitted activities, and endorsements say which clients it may serve.

The people are on the register too. Mr Salah Eddin Kaddoura’s entry (reference I023609) lists him as Licensed Director and Senior Executive Officer of Robinhood MENA Limited, effective 20 July 2026. Coindaro read both the firm and the individual pages on 22 October.

What the register does not print is a category number. Arranging deals and arranging custody are arranging activities, not dealing or holding assets, which fits the broker application reported in 2025, but the DFSA has not stated the category on the page. The licence is real; its reach is narrower than “trading and custody” might suggest on its own.

That 2025 application is the background. In August 2025, Bridge Middle East reported that Robinhood had applied to the DFSA for a Category 4 licence, the broker category, and named Mario Camara as the Senior Executive Officer for the region at the time. Today the release names Kaddoura in that role. Why the change happened is not explained. Neither Robinhood nor the DFSA has said whether the July 2026 licence is the Category 4 licence applied for then.

Who runs Robinhood MENA

Four people are named in the release. Vlad Tenev is Robinhood’s chairman and chief executive. Johann Kerbrat, senior vice president and general manager of Robinhood Crypto and International, oversees the group’s activities outside the US. Salah Kaddoura is Senior Executive Officer and President of Robinhood MENA and leads the local team. Arif Amiri, chief executive of the DIFC Authority, speaks for the financial centre.

“The DIFC is one of the world’s most important financial hubs,” Tenev said in the release. Kaddoura said that “the demand for modern, accessible financial tools across this region is immense”. Kerbrat added: “We are excited to deliver the modern, accessible financial tools these investors deserve.”

None of the three quotes gives a launch month, a client target or a figure for the investment in Dubai.

Robinhood’s international expansion, step by step

Dubai is the latest piece of a build-out that started with crypto in Europe. At the end of May 2025 the Bank of Lithuania gave Robinhood Europe UAB a crypto-asset service provider licence under MiCA, the first it issued, after an A-category investment firm licence in April, LRT reported. Robinhood announced on 2 June 2025 that it had closed its purchase of Bitstamp; The Block put the price at $200 million.

Asia followed. On 23 April 2026 the Monetary Authority of Singapore gave in-principle approval to Robinhood Singapore Pte. Ltd. for securities trading, exchange-traded derivatives and custody, among other services, with Singapore as the Asia-Pacific headquarters. An in-principle approval is not yet a licence. Bitstamp’s Asian arm separately holds a Major Payment Institution licence there.

In Canada, the acquisition of WonderFi, owner of the Bitbuy and Coinsquare platforms, closed in June 2026, according to Finance Magnates. At the time of that deal Robinhood counted more than one million funded customers outside the US.

The UK is absent from this list. We found no current Robinhood application or launch there in the sources for this story.

Crypto is also moving closer to the core of the company’s own balance sheet. On 7 October Robinhood disclosed that it had put $25 million of bitcoin on its books, Bitcoin Magazine recalled. And the group’s own blockchain is starting to show numbers: ARK Invest estimates that Robinhood Chain earned more than Ethereum in the third quarter, $51 million against $41 million. On the stock side, the company’s tokenized equities have met resistance in the US, as our report on AMC rebuffing Robinhood and the SEC objections to tokenized stocks showed.

The race for Dubai: Bybit, Revolut, eToro and Baraka

Robinhood is arriving in a crowded market. The DIFC counted 72 authorised brokerages on 31 March 2026, up from 49 in 2022, according to figures cited by Bitcoin Magazine and Finance Magnates. Finance Magnates also lists the rivals already there or on the way.

• eToro obtained a full licence in Abu Dhabi in November 2023.
• Interactive Brokers opened a DIFC office in 2024 and added Dubai and Abu Dhabi stocks in December 2025.
• Baraka, based in the DIFC, has offered shares listed on the DFM and ADX exchanges since 10 September 2026.
• Revolut announced in July 2026 an in-principle approval from VARA covering broker-dealer and exchange services, still subject to final approval.
• XTB took a different route, with Category 1 and Category 2 licences from the federal Capital Market Authority (CMA).

Those routes are not the same. A firm in the DIFC answers to the DFSA; Revolut and Bybit went to VARA in Dubai; eToro’s licence is from Abu Dhabi; XTB chose the UAE mainland. A client comparing apps in 2027 will in practice be comparing regulators too.

The size of the prize is debated. Finance Magnates notes that the MENA region drew 4.1% of organic visits to retail FX and CFD broker websites in the third quarter of 2026, against 42% for Europe. Europe’s share is ten times larger.

Bybit’s VARA licence, announced the same day

On the same Thursday, Bybit announced that Bybit Fintech FZE holds a VARA licence for exchange services in Dubai. According to the company, as reported by Cryptonomist, the licence covers spot trading only, for retail, qualified and institutional investors; derivatives need a separate approval that Bybit says it will seek. Bybit counts more than 80 million users worldwide, a figure for the whole group rather than the Dubai entity.

Cryptonomist says VARA’s register gives an issue date of 20 June 2026, an active status and the reference VL/26/10/003. Coindaro could not check that entry itself, so these details rest on Bybit and Cryptonomist. The gap between a June issue date and an October announcement is not explained. Our Bybit review covers the exchange’s products and fees.

What it changes for readers in Europe and the US

For now, nothing changes for existing Robinhood customers. US accounts stay under US rules. In the European Union, Robinhood’s crypto service runs through Robinhood Europe UAB in Lithuania, under the MiCA licence it received in 2025. MiCA lets a licensed firm passport its services to other member states: the AMF’s list shows Robinhood Europe UAB authorised to serve France under the free provision of services from 16 June 2025. Coindaro did not check Italy, where Consob’s lists are the place to look. Our guide to the MiCA regulation explains how that passport works.

A Dubai authorization does not give access to European or American clients. It covers what Robinhood may do from the DIFC, and the release says nothing about serving anyone outside the Middle East from there. For residents of the Gulf, the useful questions before 2027 are the ones any new platform should face: which entity holds the money, which regulator handles complaints, and what happens to crypto in custody if the firm fails. Our checklist on how to choose a crypto exchange lists them.

Open questions before the 2027 launch

Several answers will decide whether this becomes a real retail product or stays a regional office for a while:

• Which countries Robinhood MENA will accept clients from, and whether retail access starts in the UAE alone.
• How the company defines eligible investors, and whether any client-type condition sits on its DFSA authorization.
• Whether Robinhood MENA will seek the DFSA permissions to deal and to provide custody itself, or rely on another group firm.
• Which group entity will hold crypto for Middle East clients, Robinhood Crypto, Bitstamp or a new unit.
• Fees, which the release does not mention at all.

The next firm date is the launch itself, which Robinhood has so far placed only in 2027, without a quarter.