We are on day two at the Arab Federation of Capital Markets conference at the Grand Hyatt. Joining me is Saker Asllan, Chief Exchange Operations Officer at ADX. Thank you so much for joining us.
Hi Lucy. Great to be here.
Can we kick off talking about Tabadul? It has been the talk of the event. Can you share more about it?
It is in the heart of our operations and our business. The initiative started in 2024 — but we do not call it an initiative anymore. It is live in production. It is trading. It is active. We started with our partners Bursa Bahrain and Muscat Stock Exchange and built a network between us. What that really means is that investors sitting in Abu Dhabi — via their local broker — can access Bahrain and Muscat without the need to set up new accounts there. And when they trade, they are able to pay and settle the cash side through their local broker with their local currency.
Can you bring some more colour to the regions you are connecting?
We started within the GCC with three exchanges connected to each other, initially targeting retail clients. Then Astana International Exchange in Central Asia became interested and we connected with them. From that success, we saw huge growth. Kazakhstan Stock Exchange joined us. Armenia Stock Exchange joined us. Baku Stock Exchange joined us. So we now have multiple exchanges connected in Central Asia with more interest from other countries in that part of the world. What started with retail grew from there — we now have institutional investors, market makers, and liquidity providers trading through Tabadul. Think about the value: an active market maker with professional algo trading sitting in Abu Dhabi can now provide liquidity and quote two-way markets across all these different exchanges, increasing market depth on the order book in all of them. What started with three exchanges — we are now at eleven, with eight already in production and actively trading every day.
You are also expanding into Africa with Botswana joining. How has the operational journey been?
Tabadul is not only a technical solution. It is a multi-layer framework. There is always a legal framework when a new exchange joins — what we call an individual agreement — that is super clear between the exchanges. And there is a regulatory layer, which is the regulators in each country. We found a very efficient way that enables us to grow at this speed. The second layer is technology — connecting trading engines and exchange core systems is not so complex now with the advancement of technology. The closest comparison people know is China Connect, which links Hong Kong to mainland China. But that is a connection. Tabadul is more like a network — it enables the continuous growth of exchanges in the interval. After the technical layer there is a business layer — what happens after the trade is done. There is a whole host of post-trade activity to ensure that the trade which happens on exchange can settle, be delivered to the CSD, and the cash is paid with no disruption to end-to-end workflows. We do not ask any exchange to change their rules or way of operation. We have adapters built to work with every exchange. That is what is making it grow so fast.
What are the most exciting upcoming developments on the ADX roadmap?
Yesterday — the first day of the conference — marked a significant moment. Iraq's Stock Exchange went live. We had the first orders flowing through the system. And equally significant, we signed MoUs with both the Egyptian Stock Exchange and Damascus Stock Exchange with ADX. This is not the final legal joining, but there will be exploration about joining Tabadul. As it stands today — Jordan, Iraq, Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, and Muscat — five exchanges from the Arab Federation of Capital Markets are already individually joined. We have a very strong pipeline and we are working very hard to continue increasing the network.
Thank you for giving such a deep dive into Tabadul and everything happening across Arab capital markets.
Thank you very much, Lucy. I am definitely looking forward to more and more institutional investors joining us.
