The Colombo Stock Exchange and the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to deepen cooperation between the Sri Lankan and Emirati capital markets, Hiru News reported, citing a CSE statement.
The agreement is aimed at knowledge sharing, technological collaboration and wider cross-market access.
What the agreement covers
Cooperation extends to electronic trading systems, exchange operations, technical infrastructure, market surveillance, clearing and post-trading functions — the plumbing of an exchange rather than a listing or investment arrangement.
The two exchanges also plan joint conferences, seminars and educational programmes, and will exchange expertise on Exchange Traded Funds and derivatives. Both are products the CSE has been working to build out, and neither is deep in the Colombo market today.
The Tabadul question
The provision with the most potential consequence is an option rather than a commitment: the CSE is to explore joining Tabadul Hub, Abu Dhabi’s digital exchange network built to allow mutual market access and trading connectivity between participating exchanges across the Middle East and further afield.
Joining would, the CSE said, give international investors greater access to the Sri Lankan market while letting Sri Lankan investors reach regional and international markets. Hiru reports this as an opportunity to be examined, not a decided step.
How it came about
Discussions began after work by Sri Lanka’s Ambassador to the UAE, Prof. Arusha Cooray, during the CSE’s “Invest Sri Lanka” Investor Forum held in the UAE earlier this year — one of the island-wide and overseas investor forum programmes the exchange and the SEC have been running.
The timing sits against a market that is losing foreign money: net foreign outflows from the CSE reached Rs. 55.7 billion in the first eight months of 2026, with analysts pointing to the absence of a credit rating upgrade. An access agreement does not address that, but it widens the pool of investors who could act once sentiment turns.
Not reported
Hiru did not say when or where the MoU was signed, who signed for each exchange, or whether it carries a term, financial commitment or binding obligation. It gave no timetable for the Tabadul Hub assessment, no criteria or cost for joining, and did not name the other exchanges in that network. No figure was given for current UAE investment in the Colombo market or Sri Lankan investment in Abu Dhabi.
The report is built on a CSE statement, with no independent comment from the Securities and Exchange Commission, the ADX or any market participant. The account rests on a single newsroom; Ada Derana, the Daily Mirror, NewsFirst and EconomyNext had not carried it at the time of writing.
