Deribit received a Broker-Dealer licence from Dubai's VARA, allowing deeper spot-market integration with Coinbase. The exchange will need to show the regulated venue can match its derivatives depth.
Deribit picked up a Broker-Dealer licence from Dubai's Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority, expanding what it can do in the emirate beyond derivatives. The approval lets the exchange push deeper into spot-market activity under Dubai's virtual-asset rules, alongside its existing options and perpetuals business.
The licence fits into Deribit's integration with Coinbase, which bought the platform last year. Coinbase said the regulated setup will link Deribit's institutional client base with spot-market infrastructure, putting spot and derivatives access under one roof while keeping the permissions VARA requires.
Coinbase recently rolled out a new matching engine on Deribit that handles over 100,000 orders per second, with a deliberate delay on execution, the company said. The exchange also picked up Financial Services Permission from Abu Dhabi Global Market's regulator to build an international tokenization hub, and launched perpetuals, dated futures and crypto options for UK professional investors – more than 170 contracts across crypto, commodities, equities and currencies.
The VARA licence is another regulatory milestone for the Deribit-Coinbase combination. The question now is whether the regulated spot venue can attract the same institutional depth that made Deribit the dominant platform for crypto options and perpetuals, without diluting its core derivatives franchise.
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