When the global digital banking industry takes an average of six years to barely break even in the red ocean, Michael Chan achieved profitability for Zand Bank in just 22 months. This former Standard Chartered executive cut back on crowded retail operations and transformed the bank into a wholesale digital enterprise bank focused on corporate and blockchain services. | For more exclusive interviews, please visit the 2026 Fintech New Year Special.
(Background recap: Fidelity announced the launch of the USD stablecoin FIDD! Compliant with the GENIUS Act regulatory standards, deployed on Ethereum.)
(Additional background: Fidelity’s 2026 Crypto Market Outlook Report: More countries may establish Bitcoin reserves; long-term BTC holding remains profitable.)
Table of Contents
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- UAE’s favorable crypto environment helps Zand Bank turn losses into profits
- How Zand AED stablecoin competes with USD stablecoins
- Dubai’s natural advantages in real estate tokenization
- Who is responsible if machine-driven losses occur in the future of the machine economy?
Visitor background: Michael Chan (Mic) has a background blending technology and banking, with experience in global markets, tech, fintech, and M&A. Mic joined Zand Bank three years ago and transformed it from a “digital retail bank” into a more focused “digital corporate bank.”
UAE’s favorable crypto environment helps Zand Bank turn losses into profits
Fintech Alex: The global digital banking industry typically takes six years to break even, yet you achieved this in just 22 months at Zand—considered a digital miracle. You previously led large-scale deleveraging and regional restructuring in Southeast Asia for years. When you made the high-risk decision in 2022 to shift Zand from retail to corporate banking, did you leverage your experience in cutting inefficient assets? Which retail project was the hardest to cut?
Mic: Regarding cutting projects, it actually happened even before my first board meeting, because that was one of my conditions for joining. If the board believed this niche approach could elevate the bank to a completely different level, we had to go down that path.
Why did other banks take over six years, and I only 22 months?
First, strong support from the board;
Second, UAE’s crypto-friendly regulations.
But the real “magic” lies in positioning: we focus on fintech without licenses, and traditional banks don’t understand the “sweet spot” we target. When I joined three years ago, despite the UAE being positioned as a crypto-friendly country, the reality was that very few banks could provide foundational support.
Promoting this was not easy, because the UAE’s regulatory framework is complex, with multiple regulators and free trade zones. Zand found the right positioning by aligning national interests, banking interests, and global interests—that’s why the magic happened.
How Zand AED stablecoin competes with USD stablecoins
Fintech Alex: Zand Bank recently gained attention after receiving approval from the central bank for Zand AED (Dirham) stablecoin. You described the UAE as a free export hub for Chinese technology and capital into Africa. In your strategic blueprint, does Zand AED aim to challenge the dominance of the US dollar in BRI trade settlements?
If Kenyan importers pay Chinese suppliers directly with Zand AED, is that a threat to the traditional SWIFT system? Is this a selling point or a taboo in your high-level discussions with regulators?
Mic: Historically, trade financing has been dominated by the US dollar because different countries have different jurisdictions and capital controls.
Stablecoins are different from central bank-issued fiat currencies (CBDCs). Our stablecoin is issued by highly regulated commercial banks. We are not trying to replace the dollar; we see a gap.
For example, the UAE is a transshipment hub for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), much like Hong Kong is for China. If you conduct trade in USD, banks are closed on weekends. For large transactions like oil, if settlement is delayed by two days over the weekend, the interest loss can be substantial.
Simply replacing USD with stablecoins does not fully solve the problem. Because even if you pay with USD stablecoins, if the recipient’s bank is closed on the weekend, you cannot convert to local currency. We believe stablecoins need an ecosystem—more interoperability among different currencies—to truly operate 24/7. That is the main purpose of issuing stablecoins.
Dubai’s natural advantages in real estate tokenization
Fintech Alex: Zand has partnered with Dubai Land Department to tokenize real estate. Real estate is inherently illiquid, high-value, and heavily delayed by legal processes. How do you reconcile the contradiction between “instant on-chain transactions” and “off-chain physical property transfer”? Is Zand preparing to become the first bank to accept tokenized property fragments as collateral for instant automated lending?
Mic: In Dubai, property titles themselves are tokens, which makes many things possible. If you only hold property through an SPV (special purpose vehicle) and tokenize it, that’s not true tokenization, because you don’t save on legal costs and paperwork.
But in Dubai, the underlying is already tokenized, and the Land Department has adopted blockchain. This is an ecosystem of partnerships: we work with Ripple (using XRP Ledger), Dama provides the properties, and Dubai Land Department oversees regulation.
It’s a “happy problem”: our worst sales performance was selling to 2,000 buyers in 1 minute and 56 seconds. It was so successful that the government started worrying about inflation and property speculation. So we are stepping back to consider whether to open a secondary market.
But Dubai’s property market is very hot now, like Taipei, Hong Kong, or Shanghai in the past, where new projects sell out within hours. Even more astonishing, over 50% of buyers are overseas and purchase online. This creates opportunities for crypto payments: first comply, then enter the fiat system.
Who is responsible if machine-driven losses occur in the future of the machine economy?
Fintech Alex: With AI and the rapid development of the machine economy, how do you see the future of billions of IoT devices engaging in autonomous trading? Traditional credit is based on human reputation or corporate balance sheets. As a builder of financial infrastructure for the machine economy, how do you rate the creditworthiness of an autonomous vehicle or drone? If a machine’s transaction causes a liquidation, who is responsible?
Mic: I see the question in two parts. First is autonomous payments. Whether this becomes a trend depends on regulation, especially consumer protection laws. Second is KYC.
Traditional account opening involves KYC on humans. Now it’s on machines or agents. We might talk about KYM (Know Your Machine) or KYAI. But I think the essence is the same. Just as with corporate KYC, we look at the legal structure and ultimate beneficial owner (UBO).
For machines, we look at who owns the group of machines (UBO). Suppose Mic owns these machines; we will check not only wallet addresses, past records, and sanctions lists but also trace back to the ultimate beneficial owner, Mic.
This creates traceability, ensuring there is always a human responsible behind the scenes.
