In brief The United Arab Emirates’ (“UAE”) federal-level financial services regulator relevant to securities, commodities and now Virtual Assets Service Providers (“VASPs”), the UAE Securities and Commodities Authority (“SCA”), has just issued two new regulations relevant to Virtual Assets (“VAs”): This follows the end of the grace period under UAE Cabinet Resolution 111 (that ended on 14 September 2023) for those conducting VASP activities within Onshore UAE (see Annex) to register with the SCA. Both…
In brief Over the last few years, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has taken steps to regulate the volatile crypto industry, as seen in the recent crypto winter, and to anticipate global crypto regulatory developments including in the US and in the UK that have been called upon to regulate the sector through regulations rather than enforcement, to protect retail investors that ultimately were the major victims of the crypto winter. In 2020, the Financial…
In brief As the Dubai real estate market continues to break pre-pandemic transaction records, a new real estate law has been introduced to further support the growth of property investment funds in Dubai. With the issuance of Decree No. 22 of 2022 (the Property Investment Funds Law), a new register (the Register of Property Investment Funds) has been established at the Dubai Land Department (the DLD) which entitles registered funds certain rights to facilitate their…
Increasing the number of UAE nationals in the private sector has long been a key objective for the government. In the past, the UAE government has launched a significant number of laws and initiatives to support the localisation of the workforce. The government has recently increased its efforts in this regard and introduced a suite of new laws, including an obligation to recruit Emirati employees at the rate of 2% per year, to drive forward…
In brief The UAE Ministry of Finance (“MoF”) announced on 28 April 2022 a public consultation on the proposed federal corporate tax (“CT”) framework. The consultation will run until 19 May 2022 and businesses are encouraged to make their submissions online. The submission link can be found here: https://www.mof.gov.ae/en/resourcesAndBudget/Pages/Corporate-Tax-Submission-Public-Consultation.aspx It should be noted that the content of the public consultation document is not intended to reflect the final view of the UAE government. Therefore, the…