DUBAI—Dubai's Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority granted Deribit a Broker-Dealer Licence on Aug. 13, giving the Coinbase-owned derivatives exchange regulatory clearance to route customer spot orders directly to Coinbase Exchange for execution. The licence is a new layer on top of Deribit's existing VARA Exchange Services licence, under which the platform has offered spot trading since January 2025.
The mechanics are straightforward: spot buy, sell and trade orders submitted through Deribit's existing interface will flow to Coinbase Exchange's centralized order book for execution. Clients stay on the Deribit platform they already use—the integration works beneath the surface. A limited number of assets will continue to trade through Deribit's own spot order book, and that system stays active as a fallback.
"This licence marks the moment the Coinbase acquisition starts delivering directly for our clients," said Luuk Strijers, senior director and head of international derivatives at Coinbase. "By routing spot orders to Coinbase Exchange, we are combining the platform Deribit clients know and trust with some of the deepest liquidity in crypto and hundreds of new assets."
The practical upgrade for Deribit users is access to hundreds of additional digital assets listed on Coinbase Exchange—a sharp expansion from Deribit's current spot offering. The service covers retail, qualified and institutional investors, broadening the addressable client base beyond the professional derivatives traders who historically made up the bulk of Deribit's user base.
One structural feature ties the spot and derivatives sides of the business together. Assets purchased through the upgraded spot service are eligible to become collateral for derivatives positions on Deribit, subject to regulatory approval. That creates a closed loop: a trader buys a token on the spot side, posts it as margin and opens a derivatives position—all within the Coinbase-Deribit ecosystem. That kind of capital efficiency has historically been a draw for professional traders on offshore venues, and the Dubai setup brings it under a regulated framework.
Deribit moved its global headquarters to Dubai and came under VARA supervision in early 2025. The exchange was among the first crypto derivatives platforms to receive regulatory approval from VARA, which oversees virtual asset businesses operating in the emirate. The Broker-Dealer Licence is the second major regulatory milestone for the Dubai operation in roughly 18 months.
Coinbase acquired Deribit for $2.9 billion, making it one of the largest deals in crypto exchange history. The transaction gave Coinbase control of the dominant global venue for crypto options, where Deribit commands the majority of open interest in Bitcoin and Ethereum options contracts. The Dubai licence is the first concrete product outcome from that integration to reach clients.
Strijers' comments frame the licence as a client-facing delivery, not a regulatory checkbox. Coinbase is under pressure from institutional clients and investors to show that the Deribit acquisition generates tangible product benefits. Routing spot liquidity from Coinbase Exchange directly into Deribit's interface is the first demonstrable answer.
Coinbase has been running a parallel licensing push across the Middle East and beyond. The company secured approval in Abu Dhabi to arrange investment deals and provide custody services, with a focus on tokenized securities and on-chain capital markets. In the United Kingdom, Coinbase began rolling out 24/5 trading for nearly 4,000 U.S. stocks to eligible customers, with zero-commission trades, fractional shares starting from £1 and funding through British pounds or USDC. The three markets—Dubai, Abu Dhabi and the U.K.—reflect a strategy of building regulated product infrastructure outside the United States while domestic crypto legislation advances.
VARA has moved faster than most regulators in establishing a licensing framework for crypto derivatives and spot trading. Deribit's status as an early VARA licensee, now upgraded to include broker-dealer functions, positions the exchange as a test case for how a fully regulated derivatives-plus-spot model operates under Dubai's rulebook. The structure—spot execution through a licensed broker-dealer, derivatives on a separately licensed exchange, with collateral flowing between the two—is the kind of integrated product that regulators in other jurisdictions are still debating how to handle.
