APAC Crypto Race Heats Up as Robinhood Enters Indonesia and Binance Secures Full Abu Dhabi Licensing

Key Takeaways

• Robinhood is entering Indonesia done the acquisition of a afloat regulated section brokerage and integer plus firm.

• Binance has go the archetypal crypto speech to unafraid the afloat suite of licenses nether Abu Dhabi’s FSRA.

• APAC has emerged arsenic the astir competitory battleground for planetary exchanges implicit the past 3 years.

For years, the Asia-Pacific portion has been the astir sought-after and fiercely contested marketplace for planetary cryptocurrency firms.

This week, that contention escalated dramatically.

Robinhood announced plans to get 2 regulated Indonesian fiscal companies, marking its archetypal large propulsion into Southeast Asia.

Hours later, Binance revealed it had secured a afloat acceptable of operational licenses from Abu Dhabi’s Financial Services Regulatory Authority (FSRA), becoming the archetypal speech to run nether end-to-end regulatory supervision successful the emirate.

Together, the 2 moves awesome a pivotal infinitesimal successful the APAC crypto race, arsenic planetary giants presumption themselves to seizure immoderate of the fastest-growing integer plus markets successful the world.

Robinhood has entered into agreements to get PT Buana Capital Sekuritas, a licensed brokerage, and PT Pedagang Aset Kripto, an officially regulated integer plus trader successful Indonesia.

The dual acquisition gives Robinhood contiguous entree to 1 of the region’s astir dynamic retail trading markets, portion providing a regulatory foothold successful a state wherever crypto adoption continues to outpace accepted equities.

Patrick Chan, Robinhood’s Head of Asia, called Indonesia a rapidly increasing marketplace for trading and said the institution plans to bring the aforesaid user-friendly acquisition that helped it standard successful the U.S.

Following the deal, Robinhood volition proceed servicing existing Buana Capital customers portion expanding merchandise offerings to see entree to U.S. equities, crypto trading, and perchance different plus classes.

The acquisition marks 1 of Robinhood’s biggest steps toward planetary enlargement and signals the company’s volition to vie straight with determination exchanges specified arsenic Tokocrypto and Indodax.

While Robinhood looks to Southeast Asia, Binance has achieved a regulatory breakthrough successful the Middle East.

The FSRA of Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) granted Binance the afloat suite of licenses required to run a implicit integer plus ecosystem, including:

• a regulated exchange,

• a clearing and custody entity, and

• a broker-dealer platform.

This makes Binance the archetypal planetary speech to person end-to-end operational authorization from the FSRA—an accomplishment that could presumption Abu Dhabi arsenic a caller hub for tightly supervised crypto activity.