Katherine Ross

Abu Dhabi’s Financial Services Regulatory Authority granted Rain a Financial Services Permission on Tuesday.



The Bahrain-based crypto company is the first to receive a license to operate as a “regulated brokerage and storage services,” for some retail investors as well as institutions, according to a tweet from the company.



Rain added via Twitter thread, “This permit allows us to usher in a new era for the adoption of virtual assets in the region, as the company will be able, through this permit, to provide services for the purchase, sale and storage of virtual assets to customers, including institutions and a number of individual customers in the United Arab Emirates.”



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">يتيح هذا التصريح الدخول في حقبة جديدة لتبني الاصول الافتراضية في المنطقة، حيث ستتمكن الشركة من خلال هذا التصريح تقديم خدمات شراء الأصول الافتراضية وبيعها وتخزينها للعملاء ومنهم  المؤسسات وعدد من العملاء الافراد في الإمارات العربية المتحدة.&mdash; Rain (@rain) <a href="https://twitter.com/rain/status/1683821225204649985?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 25, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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CEO Joseph Dellago added some clarity to what this license means for Rain customers. Dellago said “residents will now be able to fund their accounts in minutes” and alluded to a ”partnership with a local UAE bank.”



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">What does this mean for customers? UAE residents will now be able to fund their accounts in minutes, thanks to a partnership with a local UAE bank. Furthermore, customers are further protected through the supervision of a local regulator and thorough legal framework.&mdash; Joseph Dallago (@_jayd3e) <a href="https://twitter.com/_jayd3e/status/1683774864249745409?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 25, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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Rain did not immediately respond to a request for comment.



Yehia Badawy, Rain’s cofounder, said that Rain initially met with regulators in 2018.



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">منذ خمس سنوات، قابلنا سلطة تنظيم الخدمات المالية في سوق ابو ظبي العالمي. يسعدنا اليوم الإعلان عن حصول <a href="https://twitter.com/rain?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@rain</a> علي تصريح الخدمات المالية&mdash; Yehia | يحي (@YehiaBadawy) <a href="https://twitter.com/YehiaBadawy/status/1683818981700907009?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 25, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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Abu Dhabi Global Market rolled out a crypto framework back in 2018. At the time, the ADGM said the regulatory framework showed its “ongoing commitment to bolster the economic diversification of Abu Dhabi through innovation and sustainable initiatives.”



In 2021, ADGM’s Shorafa Al Hammadi told Blookworks, “<a href="https://blockworks.co/news/abu-dhabi-ramps-up-effort-to-become-middle-easts-crypto-hub">The whole ecosystem in Abu Dhabi</a> [&#8230;] is working together to make it easy for all the actors of that space, to not only attract them but bring them here, to develop the legal framework.”



<a href="https://blockworks.co/news/kraken-receives-abu-dhabis-first-virtual-asset-exchange-license">Kraken initially sought and received a license</a> in Abu Dhabi in 2022, but the exchange shuttered its office there in February of this year.



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Abu Dhabi grants Rain permit for virtual assets brokerage, custody services

Morgan Chittum

<div id="highlights-block_6230ea7cf8372" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>“It looks like [the vast majority of] FAANG engineers and Web3 founders [want] to build in DAO tooling,” Alliance’s Qiao Wang told Blockworks</li>
 <li>Ink Finance, specifically, facilitates mergers and acquisitions for DAOs</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



As the number of DAOs has exploded this year to 4,832 — just the first 216 in assets under management (AUM) are responsible for $9.1 billion in Web3 assets — so has their pursuit of funding and exposure.



The uptick has been good news for one Web3 accelerator: Alliance. A record number of DAOs (decentralized autonomous organizations) and related startups will pitch to investors during <a href="https://twitter.com/alliancedao/status/1500896793453862913?s=20&amp;t=Nymm5mnpl2Ojuwcc1L7ZeA" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Alliance’s Demo Day</a> on Wednesday, Qiao Wang, a contributor, told Blockworks.



Last April, total DAO AUM was just $932 million, according to data dashboard <a href="http://deepdao.io/organizations">DeepDAO.io</a>. Specifically, 10.3% of those presenting at the Demo Day will be related to the nascent space.



“On the DAO side of things, we’re seeing an overwhelming number of [them],” Wang said. “It looks like [the vast majority of] FAANG engineers or Web3 founders [want] to build in DAO tooling.”



The startup accelerator accepted less than 5% of applicants this year. The “main goal” for roughly half the startups is to raise money, according to Wang.



Prospective applicants are considered based on the “caliber of the founders,” and “if they’re building something truly unique,” Wang said, adding that the criteria are not “absolute requirements” for acceptance.



“I don&#8217;t just look at credentials [of founders],” Wang said. ”It&#8217;s also based on an interview with myself and other partners of Alliance. [The] second thing is whether or not they&#8217;re building something novel.”



<hr class="wp-block-separator"/>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading">Alliance Presenters</h4>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li><a href="https://azuro.org" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Azuro</a> is a blockchain-betting protocol governed by a DAO. The startup bills itself as a way to replace traditional bookmakers with independent data providers, front-end operators and liquidity providers.</li><li><a href="https://www.raincards.xyz/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Rain</a> is advertised as the “credit card for DAOs,” aiming to make cryptocurrency spendable without a centralized exchange.&nbsp;</li><li><a href="http://inkfinance.xyz" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Ink Finance</a> facilitates mergers and acquisitions for DAOs in need of financing — comparable to a Web3 investment bank.&nbsp;</li></ul>



<hr class="wp-block-separator"/>



Yury Lifshits, chief executive of DAO infrastructure company Superdao, told Blockworks the startup will be presenting Wednesday to “encourage people to use [their] services.” Superdao <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/dao-startup-raises-10-5-million/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">raised $10.5 million</a> in January, raising its valuation to $160 million.&nbsp;



The number of DAOs in Alliance’s cohort, Lifshits said, will continue to grow, because the number of DAOs in Web3 will do the same. 



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“We estimate that up to one million DAOs will be created by the end of this calendar year,” he said.</blockquote>



Investing in new structures like DAOs with less lengthy track records always has some risk, general partner at VC firm Initialized Capital Brett Gibson told Blockworks. 



“DAOs are new…but there are a lot of different types of DAOs, DAO governance structures and relationships to the legal system,” Gibson said. “So if you believe in the ability of token economics to align incentives and believe the DAO is well structured and governed, a lot of risk is mitigated.”



One DAO in particular was plastered over mainstream headlines last year when a group of crypto investors raised $49 million in a bid to buy a copy of the US Constitution at Sotheby’s auction house.&nbsp;



The group — dubbed ConstitutionDAO — later <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/the-constitutiondao-raises-49m-to-buy-a-copy-of-the-us-constitution/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">lost the bid</a> to hedge fund billionaire <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/citadel-ceo-ken-griffin-outbid-a-group-of-crypto-investors-for-copy-of-u-s-constitution-11637352087" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Kenneth Griffin</a> and dissolved.



DAOs, however, have had their own pitfalls as well — despite the surge in popularity.



“There have been DAOs that I’ve been a part of that have accidentally sent millions of dollars’ worth of tokens to the wrong address and then they were just lost forever,” Will Papper, co-founder of Web3 investing DAO Syndicate, told <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2022/01/24/hundreds-of-y-combinator-alumni-join-crypto-collective-to-back-web3-startups/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">TechCrunch.</a> “We have a lot of protections in place to help users, but there’s always a tradeoff between the protection we give them and the flexibility.



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Start your day with top crypto insights from David Canellis and Katherine Ross. <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Subscribe to the Empire newsletter</a>.



Explore the growing intersection between crypto, macroeconomics, policy and finance with Ben Strack, Casey Wagner and Felix Jauvin. <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/onthemargin">Subscribe to the Forward Guidance newsletter</a>.



Get alpha directly in your inbox with the <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/research">0xResearch newsletter</a> — market highlights, charts, degen trade ideas, governance updates, and more.



The Lightspeed newsletter is all things Solana, in your inbox, every day. <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Subscribe to daily Solana news</a> from Jack Kubinec and Jeff Albus.