Caladan, an Asia-headquartered digital asset market maker, announced on 5 October 2026 that its Dubai entity had received In-Principle Approval from the Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority. The Dubai crypto licensing approval covers Broker-Dealer Services and was granted on 15 September 2026.
The release is unusually careful about what that means. It states plainly that an in-principle approval is not a licence. It adds that the entity cannot provide broker-dealer services in or from Dubai until VARA issues a full licence, and that any eventual licence will serve institutional clients only.
That candour matters, because the headline invites the opposite reading. Dubai crypto licensing is a long process with a public scoreboard. An in-principle approval is a step on it, not the finish.
What an in-principle approval actually is
VARA is the sole regulator for virtual assets across Dubai’s mainland and free zones, excluding the DIFC. It licenses eight activities, from advisory and broker-dealing to custody and exchange operation.
An in-principle approval is a conditional stage. VARA’s register says holders are “strictly prohibited” from initiating operations, conducting virtual asset activities, or servicing clients until the full licence is issued. The applicant uses the window to complete operational readiness and close remaining conditions.
The process runs in two stages. A firm first secures an Approval to Incorporate, which lets it set up a legal entity and offices but not trade. Only then can it apply for the full licence. Custody is treated separately, and a custodian must be a distinct legal entity with its own standalone licence.
Dubai crypto licensing has a public queue
VARA publishes both lists, which makes the pipeline visible. As of late July 2026, the register showed 52 fully licensed providers and 22 entries holding only an in-principle approval.
Some names have sat at that stage for a long time. Bybit’s approval has been outstanding since August 2024. Kraken, Revolut, Rain and Standard Chartered were all on the same list. Two entries carried a withdrawn status, a reminder that the register records exits as well as entries.
The pipeline does move. Flowdesk received its full broker-dealer licence in August 2026, after an in-principle approval in June. Triple-A secured its approval in July. But the gap between the two lists is where marketing and reality separate, and the register is the only reliable check.
The numbers Caladan tells
Caladan describes itself as Asia’s largest digital asset market maker. It reports $170bn in annual trading volume across 65-plus exchanges and more than 100 assets.
Those are company claims, and they are not consistent across its own materials. Its homepage shows $170bn in the desktop statistics block and $50bn in the mobile block. The $50bn figure also appears in the page’s search description.
Caladan has not reconciled the two. The same page lists 65-plus exchanges while its FAQ says more than 70. None of these figures should be read as precise.
The Singapore problem
The more interesting detail is structural. Caladan is headquartered in Singapore, and its own disclosure states that no group member is licensed or regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore. It says the Singapore entity does not conduct regulated activity or provide digital-token services in or from Singapore, and that the market-making services it describes are supplied by group members outside the country.
That is not an accident. Singapore closed the route on 30 June 2025, when Part 9 of the Financial Services and Markets Act came into force. Singapore-based digital token service providers serving only overseas customers now need a licence. MAS said it would “generally not issue” one, citing money-laundering risk and the limits of supervising substantively offshore activity. Penalties run to S$250,000 and three years’ imprisonment.
The signal was not anti-crypto. It was the end of Singapore as a flag of convenience. Firms that used a Singapore entity to serve overseas clients had to restructure or move the regulated activity elsewhere. Dubai, with VARA’s codified framework, is one of the places they moved it to.
What to watch
Caladan’s approval is a step, and the release says so. The test is whether the entity converts it into a full licence, and how long that takes. Bybit’s two-year wait is the cautionary case.
The wider question is what Dubai crypto licensing now represents. For a market maker with a Singapore address and no Singapore licence, a VARA broker-dealer authorisation would be a genuine regulatory home for institutional clients. Until then, the approval is a place in a queue, and the queue is public.
Editor’s Note
This analysis draws on the 5 October 2026 Caladan announcement, VARA’s published register, rulebooks and licensing guidance, and independent reporting on Caladan’s disclosures and Singapore’s FSMA Part 9. Where a figure is a company claim, we say so.