Building the Future of Finance The UAE’s Fintech Success

Good morning everyone. It's a great pleasure to be here today to be talking about some of the latest development that we have been working on at the central bank of the UAE. As you are aware, the world of financial services has been undergoing significant changes and significant disruptions driven mainly by disruptive technologies, new business models and of course a big shift in the consumer uh consumer behavior and we at the CBOE we have been at the forefront of this innovation and transformation. We have evolved beyond our traditional supervisory and regulatory, you know, authority to become the key enabler for the UEE digital economy. And as of today, we're not only keeping up with this change, but we're raising the bar very high, not only regionally, but also globally.

Let me start by sharing a little bit about our vision in becoming a top central bank and a top five fintech hub in the world. and our through through five different pillars. Number one is reimagining our regulatory framework. This is where we balance innovation and risk. Number two, of course, is the uh future proofing our financial market infrastructure to make sure it's uh very comprehensive, very uh ready for the future and interconnected.

Number three, the internationalization of the Dirhams be beyond the UAE borders, especially through the central bank digital currency and the Dirham stable coin, of course. And fourth is the upskilling and reskilling of talent. And fifth is strengthening our fintech ecosystem by encouraging more and more collaboration between banks, fintexs and technology companies. And just to you know give you you know more example about our work you know we now have 10 bpoke fintech regulations and um you know across all fintech activities we do have an open finance regulation a one of its kind that not only paved the way for the digital economy but also paves the way for more personalized financial products and financial services. We do have a stable coin regime that is live.

The stable coin regime is now becoming a global benchmark not only for regulators in the in the region but also for regulators and central bank across the world. And let me bring this into life. You know we've been building a number of digital platforms that touches on every single person's lives. For example, Annie, our instant payment platform which allow you to initiate and settle payment instantaneously. We're currently connecting Annie with other IPs in the world including India, China, Brazil, Turkey, Kazakhstan and many many others.

Jaiwan our car domestic scheme which will reduce significantly the fees on merchants and provide more optionality for consumers in the UEA. Third is our altaric or our open finance platform which again is paving the way for a more open economy in the in the in the UE. And fourth, our long awaited EKYC platform that will completely transform the KYC and KYB in the in the UEE. Now building on the on you know a strong financial regulatory framework and of course the FMI you know we're now taking this to the next level. We are internationalizing the dirham beyond the yi borders.

This is through the central bank digital currency both retail and crossber and of course the durham stable coin. And let me give you you know a quick look into our central bank digital currency the digital dham. First of all we are now fully ready to launch the digital dham. We will be rolling out the digital dham in phases very very soon and a phase one has a number of use cases that are all tailored and align with the digital economy. And second of all the digital dham will be provided free of charge for both consumers andmemes.

And take for example uh smart tourist. We will enable tourists that come to the UAE to top up their CBDC wallet with any account or any wallet they may have, convert any currency into digital dham, spend the digital durham in the UAE anywhere they want in the UEE and then on the way back convert it to whichever currency they want in a click of a button. In parallel, we've also been working on our Durham stablecoin regime which is now live and soon you will start seeing the Dirham stablecoin being used in domestically and for crossber use cases. You will also see the Dirham stablecoin being used on defy platforms on the web3 and on the number of tokenization uh use cases. And we're very excited about our dham stablecoin framework.

Now you may be asking what is next. We are building a state-of-the-art innovation bridge that will connect every single financial institution in the UEE with every fintech in our ecosystem along with all regulators and all technology companies including the big techs so that we allow everyone to co-create use cases together. And this is our view on how do we strengthen the fintech ecosystem in in the UAE. Looking ahead, we will be we are rolling out a number of PC's and a number of projects out of our innovation hub in Dubai where we will be looking at a state-of-the-art, you know, innovation. For example, soon you will be able to use your biometric data to make payments in the UE, whether it's your palm, your facial data, or even your Emirates ID.

And then you can make any payment across all merchants in the in the UE. Um, another example is the digitization of bank guarantees on both private and public blockchains. And this is how we will strengthen and further the trade finance ecosystem between the UAE and other countries. You also may be asking what is next in the innovation hub. We are building a first of its kind AI agentic bank in the world out of the innovation hub in Dubai.

And this is also our shared vision on enabling the ecosystem in working together and build building innovative and innovative technologies and and solution. So with this I want to you know ask everyone to join us to be part of this journey and let me close by saying that the future of finance is being built right here and right now in the UAE. Thank you.