Turkish crypto exchange Paribu buys majority stake in competitor CoinMENA

Turkish crypto exchange Paribu has acquired a majority stake in CoinMENA, a Sharia-compliant cryptocurrency exchange licensed in Dubai and Bahrain.

According to a Thursday CoinMENA announcement, Paribu acquired a majority stake in CoinMENA in a deal valuing the company at up to $240 million. The company claims the transaction is Türkiye’s largest fintech deal to date and the country’s first cross-border acquisition of a digital asset platform.

Paribu said it plans to use the acquisition to scale its operations beyond its home market. CoinMENA obtained a license from Bahrain’s central bank in early 2021 and another one from Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority at the end of 2023.

“With this acquisition, we have expanded our licensed operations to a wider geography, becoming a regulated player in one of the world’s most crypto-adoptive markets,“ Paribu founder and CEO Yasin Oral said.

Paribu and CoinMENA representatives. Source: CoinMENA

Crypto in the MENA region

Oral said he expects the deal to have far-reaching consequences “for the digital asset and broader finance ecosystem in Türkiye and the ”Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region:

“We are opening a new chapter in Paribu’s growth journey, extending our presence into the MENA region and contributing to the ongoing consolidation of the global digital asset industry.”

The announcement follows numerous developments in the MENA region over the past few months. In late November, Ripple’s dollar-pegged stablecoin was cleared for use by institutions in Abu Dhabi after winning recognition as an Accepted Fiat-Referenced Token by the local watchdog.

Also in November, a new decree by the United Arab Emirates’ central bank was reported to bring decentralized finance and the broader Web3 industry under regulatory parameters. In early October, cryptocurrency exchange Bybit secured a Virtual Asset Platform Operator License from the Securities and Commodities Authority of the United Arab Emirates.

Also in October, a Chainalysis report recognized that Turkey has emerged as the leading crypto market in the MENA region this year. Still, it also suggested that the surge in crypto volumes has been fueled more by speculative activity than sustainable adoption.

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