SCA Decision No. 27/RM of 2023 — SCA Rulebook Virtual Assets Amendment

The Decision amended SCA Decision No. 13/RM/2021, the Rulebook for Financial Activities and Status Adjustment Mechanisms. Available regulatory summaries and the amended Rulebook record indicate that the changes touched core parts of the Rulebook, including financial activities, preliminary licence approvals, fitness and propriety of employees, financial products, marketing of financial services, dealing, promotion, portfolio management, custody services, and capital adequacy.

In practical terms, the amendment moved virtual asset services into the architecture used for SCA-regulated financial services. It was not a stand-alone crypto statute. Instead, it adapted the Rulebook so that virtual asset-facing activities could be assessed through SCA licensing, conduct, custody, client-asset, employee certification and capital modules.

Cabinet Resolution No. 111/2022 defined virtual assets and VASPs, set the federal scope for virtual asset activities in the UAE, excluded financial free zones from that federal framework, and required licensing or approval by the SCA or relevant local licensing authorities before carrying on VA activities. It also assigned the SCA functions to supervise and control VA activities, VASPs and transactions and to issue resolutions required for VASP licensing and transaction regulation.

Decision No. 26/RM/2023 worked alongside the Rulebook amendment by focusing on virtual asset platform operators. It linked platform operators to the first and second sections of the Financial Activities Rulebook and most of its third section, required accepted virtual assets to be placed on an official list before trading, and imposed platform obligations covering operational resilience, operational rules, transparency, safeguarding, compliance, trading controls and access arrangements.

• Virtual asset activity perimeter: Decision 27/RM/2023 integrated virtual asset activities into the SCA Rulebook’s licensing and regulated-activity structure.
• Financial products and conduct: The amended provisions included the Rulebook article on financial products and conduct provisions covering marketing, promotion, dealing and portfolio management.
• Custody and client assets: The amendment touched custody services, aligning virtual asset custody with SCA financial services controls.
• Employee and governance controls: The affected provisions included fitness and propriety, certified jobs and licensing-assessment requirements.
• Capital adequacy: The amended Rulebook provisions extended into the Rulebook’s capital adequacy title, relevant to prudential requirements for licensed entities.

For taxonomy purposes, this profile maps the instrument to Repealed because the accessible 2026 CMA record states that Article 6 of CMA Decision No. 04/RM/2026 abrogated the VASP-related sections in Titles 1, 2 and 3 and the Glossary of the Rulebook issued under Decision No. 13/RM/2021. Editors should note, however, that the accessible 2026 record names Decision No. 26/RM/2023 as abrogated and describes the Rulebook sections as abrogated; it does not list Decision No. 27/RM/2023 by name in the summary view. The safest wording is therefore that Decision 27’s virtual asset Rulebook amendments were superseded or substantively displaced by the 2026 CMA framework.