Mal.ai has secured in-principle approval from the Central Bank of the UAE to move ahead with plans for a licensed banking operation in the Emirates, giving fresh momentum to the country’s fast-growing digital finance sector.
The preliminary clearance follows what the company described as an extensive regulatory review process and pushes Mal Group closer to unveiling a global Shariah-compliant banking platform headquartered in the UAE.
The approval arrives only months after the company closed a $230 million seed funding round — a figure being positioned as one of the largest early-stage fintech raises seen across the Middle East and Africa. The capital injection has also placed Mal among the region’s most heavily funded new banking ventures before launch.
The UAE has increasingly become fertile ground for digital finance firms, helped by a tech-savvy population, strong smartphone penetration and regulators eager to position the country as a global fintech crossroads. Authorities have spent the past few years crafting policies designed to attract financial innovation while keeping oversight tight.
Founder and CEO Abdallah Abu-Sheikh said the approval reflected the regulator’s confidence in the company’s vision to build a globally focused Islamic digital bank from the UAE, centred around ethical and Shariah-aligned finance.
According to the company, the future bank will sit within the broader Mal ecosystem, which already spans payments, wealth solutions and embedded finance offerings. The group is targeting opportunities across the rapidly expanding Islamic finance market, a sector estimated to be worth trillions of dollars worldwide.
