By Owen Evans

The United Arab Emirates said it’s discussing a currency swap line with the United States, an arrangement that would allow its central bank to tap U.S. dollars during periods of market stress.

“We have this discussion and conversation ‌with many, it’s part of an elite group that the U.S. is having this swap policy with. They are only having it with five countries,” UAE trade minister Thani Al ​Zeyoudi said at a conference in Abu Dhabi on May 4.

“Being part of that ​group means that transactions … trade, investments between both nations reach ⁠a level where that swap is highly needed … so it is ​an elite matter, [it] is not about bailing out,” he said at the “Make It In ​The Emirates” event.

Al Zeyoudi ⁠did not ​provide further details on the discussions, size ​or timeline for an agreement on the currency swap line with the United States.

According to American think tank The Brookings Institution, swap lines are arrangements under which the Federal Reserve lends foreign central banks U.S. dollars so they can supply them to foreign financial institutions.

For example, it said that they “were key to the Fed’s efforts to stabilize financial markets during the Global Financial Crisis and at the start of the COVID pandemic.”

The U.S. Federal Reserve has permanent standing ​central bank currency swap lines with five other major central banks—the Bank of Canada, ‌the ⁠Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank, the Bank of England, and the Swiss National Bank.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said last month that a number of allies in the Gulf region and in Asia had requested ​currency swap lines ​with the United ⁠States.

“Swap lines, whether it’s from the Federal Reserve or the ​Treasury, are ​to maintain ⁠order in the dollar funding markets and to prevent the sale ​of the U.S. assets in a disorderly way,” ​Bessent ⁠told lawmakers at an April 22 Senate Appropriations subcommittee budget hearing.

“So the swap line would benefit both the United Arab Emirates and the United States, and as I said, ⁠numerous ​other countries, including some ​of our Asian allies, have also requested them.”

In an interview with CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on April 21, President Donald Trump said that Washington and the United Arab Emirates might soon be working on a dollar–dirham arrangement.

“If I could help them, I would,” the president said. “It’s been a good country. It’s been a good ally of ours.”

Abu Dhabi pushed back somewhat after the president’s comments.

“Any suggestion that the UAE requires external financial backing misreads the fact,” Yousef Al Otaiba, Emirati ambassador to the United States, said in an April 21 post on X.

The last time that the United States launched a currency swap was in late 2025 with Argentina.

Following local elections that devastated Argentine President Javier Milei’s La Libertad Avanza coalition, the country’s financial markets were in turmoil over fears that the libertarian leader’s fiscal agenda was under threat. Stocks tanked, the peso plummeted, and bond prices declined.

Worried that Milei’s grip on power would erode, the United States created a $20 billion swap with Buenos Aires, halting the cash crunch. The agreement stabilized financial conditions in the Latin American economy. Milei won the legislative elections, and his government repaid the drawdown on the swap line in January.

Andrew Moran and Reuters contributed to this report.