All news is rigorously fact-checked and reviewed by leading blockchain experts and seasoned industry insiders. - Standard Asset Company opened headquarters in Abu Dhabi to run a Bitcoin plan combined with UAE real estate.
- Coinbase Asset Management will act as the sole manager of the firm’s Bitcoin holdings.
- A member of Dubai’s ruling family is listed among the company’s advisers and shareholders.
- The company has not said how much Bitcoin it owns or plans to buy.
Standard Asset Company (SAC), a UAE proprietary investment firm that counts a member of Dubai’s ruling family among its shareholders, has appointed Coinbase Asset Management as the exclusive manager of its Bitcoin holdings. The firm announced on October 27 that it had opened its headquarters in Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) to lead an anticipated $1.5 billion Bitcoin plan that pairs a BTC reserve with hotels and branded residences in the Emirates. That $1.5 billion describes the planned size of the whole platform, and SAC has published no figure for the share going into BTC.
A Dubai Royal and a Coinbase Co-CEO Hold Stakes
The legal entity behind the brand is Standard Proprietary Company Ltd., founded by Sakhib Waseem, Adam Ali and Mason Borda. Waseem, who serves as managing director, and Ali both come from advisory firm Verdant Partners, while Borda founded Tokensoft, a platform companies use to issue digital tokens. According to the company, the three have advised on more than $7 billion in transactions and helped bring over $1 billion in digital asset offerings to market, numbers that describe their past work and say nothing about capital SAC controls today.
Sheikh Mohammed Bin Maktoum Bin Juma Al Maktoum, a member of Dubai’s ruling family and chairman of Alpha MBM Investments, is listed as an adviser and shareholder. In the announcement he said the Coinbase arrangement would bring institutional discipline to the firm’s digital asset holdings, with returns meant to flow into UAE hospitality and property. His involvement is personal, and nothing in the release links Dubai’s government or any sovereign fund to the money behind the plan.
The same list of advisers and shareholders names Mick Mulvaney, former acting White House chief of staff, Lord Iain McNicol of the UK House of Lords, and Brett Tejpaul, co-CEO of Coinbase Institutional, who praised SAC’s model in the release. A senior executive of the manager therefore holds equity in the client, a relationship that becomes more relevant once the fees and scope of the Coinbase mandate are made public.
How Bitcoin Is Meant to Fund Hotels
Coinbase Asset Management, headed by president Anthony Bassili, a former BlackRock executive, takes charge of the Bitcoin side. Company materials point to phased BTC purchases and a managed yield strategy, with retained proceeds recycled either into more Bitcoin or into property. Bitcoin produces no income simply by sitting in a wallet, so any yield has to come from putting the coins to work, typically by lending them, posting them as collateral or selling options against them. Each of those routes adds counterparty or liquidity risk, and SAC has not said which ones it plans to use. Coinbase Asset Management already has experience on this front through the Coinbase Bitcoin Yield Fund, which it launched in May 2025 for investors outside the US to earn a conservative return paid in BTC.
The real estate leg works in the opposite direction. Hotels and branded residences generate rental and operating cash flow, though they also absorb capital for maintenance, staffing and refurbishment. Corporate Bitcoin buyers have mostly financed their holdings through share sales, debt or spare operating cash. SAC is trying to attach the reserve to property that pays its own way, which in theory makes the structure less dependent on the BTC price alone.
The Figures SAC Has Not Published
| Question | Status |
|---|---|
| Bitcoin share of the $1.5B | Not disclosed |
| Current BTC holdings | Not disclosed |
| Capital fully raised | Not confirmed |
| Purchase schedule | Phased, no dates |
| Target properties | None named |
| Bitcoin manager | Coinbase Asset Management |
Based on SAC’s announcement and website
SAC describes itself as a proprietary company investing its own capital and states that it is not a licensed financial services provider, so its ADGM address should not be read as proof that it holds an asset management licence. Waseem said in the release that ADGM’s regulatory clarity made it the natural base for the firm.
What Would Turn the Plan Into Real BTC Demand
For the Bitcoin market, the announcement creates no measurable buying pressure yet, because there is no confirmed allocation or acquisition schedule to model. The first verifiable signal would be a disclosed purchase or a published holdings figure, followed by the terms of the Coinbase mandate, including whether it covers discretionary trading, lending or custody. A named hotel or residential acquisition would show whether the property side is moving at the same pace.
For Coinbase, the deal extends its asset management arm into a separately managed mandate tied to Gulf property, a different line of work from its exchange and custody business. SAC is arriving as competition for wealthy UAE clients intensifies, with Kraken’s parent Payward securing approval from Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority this month. SAC’s choice of Abu Dhabi over Dubai, despite its Dubai royal shareholder, also places its future disclosures under ADGM’s framework rather than VARA’s.
