Stablecoins now move trillions of dollars a year, but getting them to someone without a bank account or a smartphone is another matter. Joining me is Ramy Soliman, Co-Founder of the Middle East Stablecoin Association and Co-Founder and CEO of Saleem. Ramy, welcome to the show.
Nice to be here. Thank you.
You have worked on stablecoins much longer than most. What has actually changed in the last year?
There has been a market shift in regulations and clarity globally and in the region. It started with MiCA in 2024. Then of course the GENIUS Act in the US, which brought federal framework to the world’s biggest stablecoin market. More regionally, we have had a lot of regulation here — the CBUAE payment token regime, the FSRA ADGM fiat reference token regime from the beginning of this year. Over the last 18 to 24 months there has been a substantial shift in the amount of regulatory clarity. You can see that going in step with institutional adoption. Banks that were anti-stablecoin three to four years ago are now looking at it as a real option.
As co-founder of MESA you have mapped seven different stablecoin rulebooks just across the Gulf. What does that fragmentation mean in practice?
We counted seven. A stablecoin may need to stop at seven different jurisdiction borders to move — which defeats the purpose. However, we are mature enough to know that there is passportability, mutual acceptance of other people’s rules, ways to make this work. Every country will have its own specific framework, but ultimately if they can find a common platform of uniformity around the main rules for redemption, transfer, and ownership rights, you can allow that trade to happen again.
You found that no regulator has a plan for when a stablecoin loses its peg. Why does that gap matter?
The local regulatory regimes do not have a deep de-peg process, but they still have a redemption process. The mechanics of a de-peg do not necessarily need to be written in a rulebook — as long as the rules governing what a stablecoin should be in that regulated regime are solid. NYDFS did not have a de-peg playbook, but you know you should have redemption at par as the issuer. You know you should be communicating with your regulator and your customers. Those things are known anyway. Issuers should have that maturity to work with the regulation.
Tell us about Saleem — what problem are you solving?
It combines my experience with stablecoins with a real problem in remittances and money movement for the unbanked. It is very easy for us in the developed world to send a stablecoin — we have a wallet, a smartphone, data. But that is only half the story because the people on the receipt side are in underserved countries. They generally have no bank account, no mobile money wallet, maybe no smartphone, maybe no internet. Over 1.3 billion people across the world do not have a bank account. Another 1 billion have a phone but not a smartphone — just SMS. These are typical recipients of remittances, aid, and disbursements. From the UAE alone, $55 billion gets sent out in remittances. In Syria, the World Bank says $8 billion flows annually while the central bank says $3 billion — there is a huge gap. The idea of Saleem is: how do we make any institutional treasury, corporate, NGO, or government do disbursements to people who cannot be reached with normal channels? The answer is wrapping a stablecoin wallet around a phone number as the identifier.
Why build Saleem in Abu Dhabi?
Abu Dhabi was way ahead in stablecoin and crypto regulation. ADGM came out with the first crypto regime in 2017 or 2018 and had already been a pioneer in this space. It is based on UK common law, which is a good legal environment coming from the UK. And it is the gateway — everything is happening here. You meet the vendors, the remittance senders, the exchanges. The majority of the experience is actually in Abu Dhabi.
Thank you very much for sharing your insights. Best of luck with Saleem.
My pleasure. Thank you very much.
