2026-09-07
On 7 September 2026 DMCC, the Dubai free zone for commodities trade, announced the formal launch of the world’s largest silver bar as the first tokenised commodity asset under the DMCC-VARA tokenisation framework. The bar weighs 1,971 kg, is made of 99.9% pure silver, holds a Guinness World Record and was manufactured in the UAE by SAM Precious Metals to commemorate 1971, the founding year of the United Arab Emirates. Fractional digital interests in the bar are issued by Tokinvest, a Dubai platform licensed by the Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA), as an Asset-Referenced Virtual Asset (ARVA) with tokens deployed on BNB Chain. Access opened on 7 September 2026 to eligible investors, including retail investors, and regulated secondary-market trading is scheduled to follow the initial issuance. The physical bar stays in the UAE: it is registered and verified through DMCC Tradeflow and held in custody by Brink’s. The announcement does not disclose the price of a token, the minimum ticket or the number of fractions.
What was launched on 7 September 2026
The launch delivers on a plan first announced at DMCC’s Dubai Precious Metals Conference in November 2025, when the bar was unveiled after receiving official recognition from Guinness World Records. According to the DMCC release, eligible investors are now able to acquire fractional digital interests linked to the 1,971 kg asset. Tokinvest is responsible for the regulated issuance and distribution of the digital interests and for the subsequent secondary-market trading, which is “scheduled to open following the initial issuance, subject to applicable regulatory and platform requirements”. Paul Boots, Senior Director and Head of Sector Development at VARA, described the product, called the Silver Bar ARVA, as “the first tokenised commodity asset issued under the DMCC-VARA framework” and said it shows how Dubai can “bring together established commodities infrastructure, regulated virtual asset issuance, institutional custody and blockchain technology to turn tokenisation from concept into a practical, investable product”.
Ahmed Bin Sulayem, Executive Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of DMCC, said that when the bar was unveiled in November 2025 DMCC “set out a clear ambition to take it from a physical record into a practical example of commodity tokenisation, with the DMCC-VARA tokenisation framework as the roadmap. Today, we are delivering on that ambition.” Scott Thiel, Co-Founder and CEO of Tokinvest, said: “For the first time, investors can own a fractional interest in this extraordinary, one-of-one physical asset. Until now, owning something like the world’s largest silver bar was simply beyond the reach of almost every investor.” Gulf News, which reported the launch the same day, summarised the structure in one sentence: investors get exposure to a specific physical commodity while ownership is divided into smaller digital interests.
The bar: 1,971 kg, 1.3 metres, about 63,370 troy ounces
The bar was revealed at the 13th Dubai Precious Metals Conference on 24 November 2025, according to the Dubai Government Media Office, which described it as a 1,971 kg, 1.3-metre-long bar that set a Guinness World Record. At the standard conversion of 31.1035 grams per troy ounce, 1,971 kg of silver is about 63,370 troy ounces; Khaleej Times reported the same figure, 63,369 ounces, in December 2025. The manufacturer, SAM Precious Metals, is a Dubai-based refiner that refined, cast and finished the bar in-house; the company holds UAE Good Delivery accreditation for gold and silver and Responsible Jewellery Council certifications. Its Principal CEO, Sami Abu Ahmad, said the bar was created “to represent both the strength of the UAE’s precious metals industry and the significance of 1971 in the country’s history”.
The launch announcement does not state an official valuation of the bar. One reference point exists: in August 2026 Tokinvest ran a promotion whose prize was “a 1 kg allocation of the Silver Bar” in tokens, which the platform valued at approximately AED 9,971 at prevailing market rates. At that price level the metal content of the whole 1,971 kg bar is worth roughly AED 19.7 million, or about USD 5.4 million; the actual value of the fractions will move with the silver price and with the terms of the issuance. In the same August 2026 note Tokinvest stated that the bar is stored in the Almas Vault in Dubai under Brink’s security.
How the tokenisation works: six parties, one physical asset
| Party | Role in the Silver Bar ARVA |
|---|---|
| SAM Precious Metals | Refined and manufactured the 1,971 kg bar of 99.9% pure silver in the UAE |
| DMCC Tradeflow | Registers and verifies the physical bar; DMCC’s platform for registering possession and ownership of commodities stored in UAE-based facilities |
| Brink’s | Secure custody and logistics for the physical bar (vault storage in Dubai) |
| Tokinvest | VARA-licensed issuer and broker-dealer: issues the fractional interests as an ARVA on BNB Chain, distributes them to eligible investors and will run regulated secondary-market trading |
| VARA | Dubai’s virtual assets regulator; the issuance falls under its Virtual Asset Issuance Rulebook and the joint DMCC-VARA framework |
| DMCC | Free zone authority for commodities; partner in the framework, operator of Tradeflow, home to the precious metals and crypto ecosystems involved |
The key term is ARVA. VARA’s Virtual Asset Issuance Rulebook, in force since 19 June 2025, contains a dedicated annex for Asset-Referenced Virtual Assets, tokens that represent ownership of a real-world asset such as a commodity, and treats their issuance as a Category 1 VA issuance activity that requires a VARA licence. Tokinvest FZCO holds exactly that licence: Virtual Asset Broker-Dealer Services and Category 1 VA Issuance, licence VL/2024/12/004, registered in January 2025; the company is also a DMCC member (DMCC-928046) and registered with the Securities and Commodities Authority as a virtual asset service provider. In September 2025 Tokinvest announced VARA’s first multi-asset issuance licence and a USD 3.2 million pre-seed round, after selling out its debut asset, a fractionalised racehorse issued with Evolution Stables.
For the investor the structure differs from buying a silver ETF or a gram of allocated metal at a bank. The token references a specific, identifiable object, one bar with a Guinness certificate, rather than a pool of standard bars, and the object cannot be split physically. What the token confers is a fractional interest in that object; what the investor pays, how many fractions exist and whether physical redemption is possible are governed by the offering documents, which had not been published in the announcement at the time of writing. Tokinvest’s own investor note from November 2025 lists the practical entry conditions: access depends on the investor’s jurisdiction and regulatory status, and on completing KYC and AML checks with a valid government ID and a proof of address not older than three months. The same note warns that digital assets can be volatile and that investors “may lose some or all of their invested capital”.
The DMCC-VARA framework and the wider UAE tokenisation pipeline
The framework behind the launch is a strategic partnership signed by DMCC and VARA on 8 October 2025 to build “a secure, transparent and scalable framework for tokenised commodities”. It provides for pilot projects in gold, diamonds and other commodities, joint work on technical and regulatory requirements, investor protection and education, and the sharing of aggregated sector data to inform VARA’s rule-making. At the time DMCC counted about 26,000 member companies, more than 1,500 of them in gold and precious metals, and more than 700 Web3 firms in the DMCC Crypto Centre; by September 2026 the DMCC Tech ecosystem had grown to over 4,000 companies, including more than 750 Crypto Centre members. The October 2025 agreement named gold and diamond pilots; the silver bar is, in VARA’s words, the first tokenised commodity asset issued under the framework, and the first to complete the full path from Tradeflow registration to a regulated public issuance.
The launch fits a series of UAE tokenisation moves covered on this site. In June 2026 DMCC signed a memorandum of understanding with Tether on asset tokenisation and blockchain education. In July 2026 Mubadala Capital put a private markets fund on the blockchain in a deal with Coinbase. In September 2026 First Abu Dhabi Bank completed live US dollar transactions with Citi using tokenised deposits, and Standard Chartered launched institutional bitcoin and ether spot trading through DIFC. DMCC itself has been reorganising its commodity verticals: in August 2026 it created a separate lab-grown diamond vertical as UAE trade in the category reached a record 76.9 million carats. The silver bar adds a regulated retail product to a list that until now consisted mainly of institutional pilots.
What the launch means for businesses in the UAE
- Precious metals traders and refiners. The path used for the silver bar, registration of the physical commodity on DMCC Tradeflow, custody with a licensed vault operator and issuance through a VARA-licensed platform, is now a tested route. DMCC hosts more than 1,500 gold and precious metals companies, and Tradeflow already serves as the UAE’s system for registering and pledging commodities, so the incremental step for a member with stock in a Dubai vault is the issuer relationship and the VARA approval of the specific product.
- Fintech and Web3 founders. Issuing a token that references a physical asset in Dubai is a licensed activity under VARA’s Virtual Asset Issuance Rulebook; the relevant licence categories are VA Issuance (Category 1 for asset-referenced tokens) and Broker-Dealer Services, and Tokinvest’s licence is a live example of the combination. A DMCC licence with a Crypto Centre membership is the usual corporate wrapper for such a business, and the free zone counts more than 750 Crypto Centre members.
- Investors and family offices. Retail access is stated in the announcement, but eligibility is determined by Tokinvest’s onboarding rules, which depend on jurisdiction, regulatory status and KYC. Investors based in the UAE with a residence visa, an Emirates ID and a local proof of address meet the documentary side of that test directly; the financial terms should be read in the offering documents before subscribing, and the secondary market will not exist until it is opened after the issuance.
- Tax and accounting. For tax and accounting purposes a tokenised interest in silver is a digital asset, and its treatment should be checked against the rules that apply to virtual assets; for VAT the Federal Tax Authority has published rules for converting digital currency amounts into dirhams. Companies that plan to hold or trade such tokens should agree the accounting treatment with their auditor before the first purchase rather than after the year end.
- Vault and logistics operators. Brink’s role in the project, from secure transport to vault storage and ongoing custody, shows where the physical side of tokenisation is earned: the custodian of record is named in the product, and custody in a UAE-based facility is the condition for Tradeflow registration.
How Atlant Capital can help
Atlant Capital sets up companies in Dubai and across the UAE for precious metals traders, refiners, commodity brokers, fintech and Web3 businesses and family investment vehicles. We select the jurisdiction and licensed activities for the actual business model, whether a DMCC licence for gold and silver trading with access to Tradeflow and the Crypto Centre, another free zone or a mainland company, and take the client through company formation, corporate bank account opening and work visas and residency for owners, directors and employees. Accounting, audit, VAT and corporate tax filings are handled by licensed accounting firms from our partner network.
Conclusion
The Silver Bar ARVA is the first product to run the full length of Dubai’s commodity tokenisation chain: a bar made by a UAE refiner, registered on DMCC Tradeflow, stored by Brink’s, issued as an asset-referenced virtual asset by a VARA-licensed platform on BNB Chain and opened to retail investors on 7 September 2026, with regulated secondary trading to follow. The unknowns are commercial rather than regulatory: the price per fraction, the minimum ticket and the number of fractions were not published in the announcement. For businesses in the UAE the precedent matters more than the object: the route from vault to token now has a worked example, a named regulator and a named licence category.
FAQ
What is the world’s largest silver bar and who made it?
A 1,971 kg bar of 99.9% pure silver, about 1.3 metres long and roughly 63,370 troy ounces, manufactured in the UAE by the Dubai refiner SAM Precious Metals. Its weight commemorates 1971, the founding year of the UAE. The bar holds a Guinness World Record and was unveiled at the 13th Dubai Precious Metals Conference on 24 November 2025.
How can investors buy a fraction of the silver bar?
Through Tokinvest, a Dubai platform licensed by VARA for Category 1 VA Issuance and Broker-Dealer Services. Tokinvest issues the fractional interests as an Asset-Referenced Virtual Asset (ARVA) on BNB Chain; access opened on 7 September 2026 to eligible investors, including retail investors, after KYC and AML checks. The price per token, the minimum investment and the number of fractions were not disclosed in the launch announcement.
Where is the physical silver bar kept?
The bar remains a physical asset in Dubai. It is registered and verified through DMCC Tradeflow, DMCC’s platform for recording possession and ownership of commodities stored in UAE-based facilities, and held in custody by Brink’s; Tokinvest stated in August 2026 that the bar is stored in the Almas Vault under Brink’s security.
What is the DMCC-VARA tokenisation framework?
A strategic partnership signed by DMCC and the Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority on 8 October 2025 to create a secure, transparent and scalable framework for tokenised commodities, with pilot projects in gold, diamonds and other commodities, investor protection and education, and data sharing to inform regulation. The Silver Bar ARVA, launched on 7 September 2026, is the first tokenised commodity asset issued under it.
