Dubai’s crypto regulator has issued an alert, warning of firms falsely claiming to be part of the city’s high-profile real estate tokenization pilot, saying that such misrepresentation may violate the emirate’s virtual asset laws.

The Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA), in coordination with the Dubai Land Department (DLD), said on Tuesday that several entities have improperly suggested they are participating in the DLD’s blockchain-based property title deed initiative, which launched as a limited pilot on March 19.

“No entities beyond those explicitly approved by DLD and VARA are authorised to participate,” the regulator said. “Any entity promoting their involvement in the project without formal confirmation… is misrepresenting their status.”

VARA did not name any firms in the release.

The tokenization initiative could account for 7% of all property deals, valued at 60 billion dirhams ($16 billion), by 2033, CoinDesk previously reported, as part of the city’s broader push to position itself as a global tech and digital asset hub.

This warning from VARA comes days before Token 2049 kicks off in the city. Earlier in March, on-chain investigator ZachXBT pointed out that the conference tends to attract a disproportionate amount of scams.

Metaplanet (3350) has reached a major milestone in its bitcoin (BTC) strategy, the Japanese hotel company now holds 5,000 BTC as part of its treasury operations.

Its BTC stash is valued at approximately $428.1 million at an average acquisition cost of around $85,621 per coin.

The Tokyo-listed firm continues to double down on bitcoin as a reserve asset, with its latest purchase of 145 BTC made at an average price of approximately $93,327 per coin, totaling roughly $13.6 million.

The accumulation strategy has achieved a year-to-date (YTD) BTC Yield of 121.1% in 2025. This yield metric reflects the company’s effective increase in bitcoin per share held.

Notably, BTC Yield is a proprietary KPI Metaplanet uses to track treasury performance. It isolates gains driven purely by bitcoin acquisition strategies while neutralizing dilution from newly issued shares. In Q1 2025 alone, the company saw a yield of 95.6%.

Shares of Metaplanet were trading 5% lower at the time of writing.

Disclaimer: This article, or parts of it, was generated with assistance from AI tools and reviewed by our editorial team to ensure accuracy and adherence to our standards. For more information, see CoinDesk’s full AI Policy.

Major tokens fell as much as 5% on Thursday as traders took profits on a steady move higher from earlier this week, with memecoin dogecoin (DOGE) leading losses among the largest assets.

Bitcoin (BTC) clung to the $93,000 zone in the past 24 hours, but XRP, Solana’s SOL, BNB Chain’s BNB and DOGE showed losses above 2%. Ether (ETH) fared relatively better with a 1.5% slump.

Overall market cap decreased 2.5%. The broad-based CoinDesk 20, a liquid index tracking the largest tokens by market cap, fell over 3%.

Spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in the U.S. bagged over $916 million in inflows on Wednesday. Some traders point to the asset’s growing safe haven as a catalyst underpinning this surge in flows.

“The inflows are driven by a declining U.S. dollar index, and Bitcoin’s growing safe-haven appeal amid equity market volatility,” Vugar Usi Zade, COO at Bitget, told CoinDesk in an email. “The massive ETF inflows reflect Bitcoin’s strengthening position as a leading crypto asset, with growing institutional adoption.

“Its reduced correlation with equities and safe-haven narrative position it as a diversification tool, though short-term challenges like weak investment signals require sustained macro catalysts,”

Bitcoin’s safe-haven narrative has been growing in the past week on its relevant resilience, mirroring gold’s price rise, even as bond yields and U.S. equities corrected amid the ongoing tariff wars.

Earlier this week, President Donald Trump said he had no intention to fire Federal Reserve Chair Powell and that a deal with China (which is facing tariffs as high as 245% on some items) would significantly reduce some of its levies.

The mixed signals and frequent tone shift are jading traders, however, who continue to monitor comments for further cues on positioning.

“Macro risks remain, but one critical overhang appears to be cleared. Trump is signaling no intention to replace Fed Chair Powell for now. The reassurance has prompted a modest pullback in long-end yields, helping reduce a key tail risk,” Singapore-based QCP Capital said in a broadcast message Thursday.

“The broader outlook, however, is anything but simple. Trade frictions, geopolitical jitters, and regulatory opacity continue to cast long shadows,” the firm added.