Clients got back about AED 1.2 billion ($327 million) in refunds in the first nine months of 2026, the UAE’s Capital Market Authority (CMA) said yesterday (Monday). The figure for the same period a year earlier was AED 8 million.
The number of companies holding a CMA license rose 43% year-on-year, and the regulator handled 192% more complaints, according to its nine-month update.
The refunds are about 111 times the AED 10.8 million the CMA reported for the whole of 2025 in its annual report.
London’s trading industry is coming home!
The refunds come as more retail brokers take full licenses from the federal regulator, which has also drawn a queue of CFD brokers seeking Category 5 marketing licenses this year.
Category 1 lets a broker onboard clients and execute trades locally, while Category 5 covers promotion and introduction, the tiers FM Intelligence’s guide to the CMA framework explains for foreign brokers.
Its public register, which FM Intelligence’s license and registration monitoring tracks, listed 28 firms cleared for over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives and spot forex trading on Monday, up from 11 at the end of 2024.
The update is the first nine-month report since Federal Decree-Laws No. 32 and 33 of 2025 took effect on January 1, turning the Securities and Commodities Authority (SCA) into the CMA with wider supervisory powers, a change that has drawn more brokers to mainland licenses.
More Retail Brokers Hold Trading Licenses
The CMA’s 2025 annual report put the number of licensed companies at about 244 at the end of last year. Accredited professionals rose 64% in the first nine months of 2026, the regulator said.
Chief Executive Officer Waleed Saeed Al Awadhi said the growth in licensed companies and continued fundraising “reflect the strength of our markets and their capacity to support economic activity.”
The register shows part of that growth in retail trading. Firms licensed for OTC derivatives and spot forex rose to 21 at the end of 2025, the annual report shows, and the register held 28 by Monday.
The list includes XTB, which added Category 1 and 2 licenses in April, and RoboMarkets, which won its Category 1 license in September 2025. Units of Plus500, Exness, Capital.com and Deriv are also on it.
Exinity, which runs FXTM, said in April it would move from Category 5 to Category 1. By FinanceMagnates.com’s calculation, the number of OTC and spot forex licensees is about 2.5 times what it was at the end of 2024, while 142 firms on the register hold the lighter promotion permission.
Refunds Dwarf the Whole of 2025
In May, the regulator said it had facilitated an AED 1.2 billion settlement between one investor and a licensed brokerage firm, Khaleej Times reported at the time, without naming either party. Monday’s release did not link the two figures.
Penalties grew faster in number than in value. Their count climbed 246%, while their total value rose 23% to AED 12.9 million, so the average penalty was about 64% smaller than a year earlier, by FinanceMagnates.com’s calculation.
Warnings rose 767%. The release gave percentages, not counts, for warnings and penalties. For the whole of 2025, the CMA’s annual report lists 99 warnings, 73 fines and 75 complaints handled.
New Rules for Crypto and Finfluencers
The CMA issued six regulatory instruments in the period, including its Virtual Assets Regulatory Framework and Basel III-aligned capital requirements for licensed firms. It registered 102 virtual assets for admission to trading in the third quarter through a new digital service.
The regulator added 88 financial influencer registrations, and the total reached 198 at the end of September. In April, the registry listed 171 names, when a FinanceMagnates.com review found broken and mismatched social media links across the database.
Foreign investors accounted for 49% of the AED 408 billion traded on the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange (ADX) and Dubai Financial Market (DFM) in nine months, a market Interactive Brokers opened to its international clients.
The two exchanges had a combined market capitalization of AED 3.7 trillion at the end of September, and both general indices closed the month higher than a year earlier.
This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.
