Dubai’s DFSA Adds XRP, Toncoin Tokens in Its Free Trade Zone

The Dubai Financial Services Authority (DFSA) added two tokens of, XRP and Toncoin to its list of recognized tokens on November 2.

The two tokens are currently recognized alongside Bitcoin, Ether, and Litecoin in the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC).

According to this new status, financial institutions in the DIFC can now conduct transactions with these tokens. The special Emirati economic zone is home to over 4,000 companies, and Ripple has already established its MENA headquarters in the DIFC in 2020.

The company said that around 20% of Ripple customers are in the Middle East.

In this regard, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse said: “It’s refreshing to see the DFSA encourage the adoption and use of digital assets such as XRP to position Dubai as a leading financial services hub intent on attracting foreign investment and accelerating economic growth.”

DFSA is responsible for regulating the DIFC alone. In October 2021, the DFSA introduced regulations on cryptocurrency and further strengthened them in November 2022.

Recently, the DIFC announced a proposed Digital Assets Law to define the legal nature of digital assets, their ownership, and how they can be controlled, transferred, and dealt with by interested parties.

Additionally, the DIFC proposed a repeal of the 2005 Law of Security and the Financial Collateral Regulations and recommended the introduction of an updated Law of Security that would encompass collateral regulations as well.

The proposed Security Law will be modeled after the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law’s secured transactions model, with some modifications. These laws are currently in the consultation phase, with the deadline set for November 5.

This development follows the recent passing of the Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) Foundations Regulations in the Abu Dhabi Global Market, which took effect on November 1.

In Dubai, the Dubai Virtual Asset Regulatory Authority (VARA) was established in March 2022, with the authority to regulate all the emirate and its free trade zones, except the DIFC. A virtual assets law was also introduced in the emirate at the same time.