By Nell Mackenzie

(Reuters) – Brevan Howard conducts a significant portion of its cryptocurrency trading from the United Arab Emirates due to the country’s “reasonable regulations,” a hedge fund official said at the AIM conference in Dubai on Monday.

“The UAE regulators are tough, but they want the industry to take off and so they write sensible regulations and they are willing to talk with the industry to change those regulations,” Ryan Taylor, head of Brevan hedge fund group compliance. Howard, said during a panel on hedge fund trends and strategies.

Taylor said Brevan Howard’s cryptocurrency trading operations accounted for about $2 billion of the company’s total strategies, which he said exceeded $30 billion. Beyond saying that the UAE’s share of trade was significant, he gave no specific indication.

“We’re also seeing new opportunities, like those here in the UAE, whether from the equity market or other opportunities, and we’re really all excited about that,” said Brandon Robinson, deputy director private markets at JPMorgan Asset Management, said during the same debate.

Robinson, who oversees a department at JPMorgan that invests in certain hedge funds, said the bank is talking with a number of managers in the industry.

“The growth has been unprecedented. We thought growth was up last year. It’s more of the same,” said Jonathan Beardall, head of wealth and asset management at the Authority. Dubai International Financial Center (DIFC).

Dubai has 65 hedge funds registered in the city center and this number is expected to increase to 70 in the coming weeks, Beardall said.

Hedge fund trading on macroeconomics rose 3.6% for the year ending September, compared with the same period last year, hedge fund research firm Pivotal Path found.

(Reporting by Nell Mackenzie; editing by Dhara Ranasinghe and Barbara Lewis)