Robinhood heads to Dubai as Dubai-based Bybit plots its way into the US

Robinhood (NASDAQ: HOOD) has committed to a 2027 date to launch in the Middle East after the Dubai Financial Services Authority (DFSA) gave the regulatory green light on the firm’s retail investing app in the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC). 

News of the 2027 expansion into the Middle East landed as the Dubai-based Bybit is planning a move on Robinhood’s home turf in the United States.

What Robinhood’s Dubai license covers

The DFSA approval Robinhood received allows it to offer trading and custody across all 10 asset classes the regulator permits, including equities, ETFs, crypto, and investment tokens. 

Salah Kaddoura was named senior executive officer and president of Robinhood MENA, leading the local team that will operate out of a regional headquarters in the DIFC and open to local investors in 2027.

Chairman and CEO of Robinhood, Vlad Tenev, noted the importance of entering “one of the world’s most important financial hubs,” as he described the DIFC in the firm’s statement. 

Robinhood has been on the expansion trail this year, following an April Asia-Pacific entry via Singapore and a June acquisition of WonderFi in Canada. As of July, the broker counted close to 28 million customers across 38 countries, per its own global expansion update.

The DIFC that Robinhood is entering now had 72 authorized brokerage firms on its register as of March 31, 2026.

The list has only grown since, with Revolut earning in-principle approval from Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA) in July, and local app Baraka in September. Older market entrants include eToro in November 2023 and Interactive Brokers in 2024. 

Is Bybit expanding into the US?  

The CEO of the Dubai-based Bybit, Ben Zhou, is reportedly exploring entering the US by way of a broker that already serves American clients. Notably, the exchange has not committed to a launch date or partner yet, even though Interactive Brokers has been floated as a potential fit.

In the meantime, the exchange, which set up its international headquarters in Dubai in 2022, has continued to consolidate its presence in its home base.

“Dubai has made significant progress in building a regulatory environment for virtual assets,” Zhou said after the exchange secured a Virtual Asset Service Provider (VASP) license from VARA for spot exchange services.

Meanwhile, Peter Loo, the exchange’s Chief Legal and Compliance Officer, is already looking at stacking fresh licenses, including for derivatives, “subject to the necessary regulatory approvals.”

Building the platform before the market

Bybit’s US ambition rests on a product it rolled out on October 12, when it opened trading in more than 1,000 US-listed stocks and ETFs, funded in the USDC stablecoin. Orders are executed and custodied by Alpaca Securities, a FINRA and SIPC member, with Mauritius-regulated Infra Capital Limited acting as introducing broker.

For now, the setup excludes US users. The exchange, which says it has more than 80 million users, is effectively selling American equities to everyone but Americans. 

The service marks a shift from the stock CFDs Bybit has offered since June 2025, giving clients direct economic ownership of shares rather than a bet on price.

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