🇦🇪 **First Bank in UAE Launches Retail Crypto Trading**
RAKBANK has become the first traditional bank in the UAE to allow customers to trade cryptocurrencies directly in dirhams (AED) through its own banking app.
- Supports buying, selling, and exchanging crypto without transferring funds to exchanges and without currency conversion fees.
- The service is implemented in partnership with Bitpanda, licensed by VARA (Dubai).
- Supports eight popular cryptocurrencies.
- Involves dirham-denominated accounts, with custody and execution handled via Bitpanda's infrastructure.
- Bitpanda also collaborates with Deutsche Bank, N26, and Raiffeisen.
**RAKBANK** – The National Bank of Ras Al Khaimah (Public Joint Stock Company), one of the oldest and fastest-growing banks in the UAE.
**Bitpanda** – A European fintech company and crypto broker founded in 2014 in Vienna, Austria.
👉 Minor adoption boost as UAE retail crypto access expands via RAKBANK, but impact limited without federal-level backing; watch SEC's spot-SOL ETF decision by July 31 for institutional momentum.
