DUBAI: BitOasis, a Middle East-focused cryptocurrency exchange based in the United Arab Emirates, said on Sunday it laid off nine of its staff, the latest company in the sector to cut jobs in the face of a downturn and market turmoil.

The cryptocurrency market has been rocked by extreme volatility with crypto lender Celsius Network freezing withdrawals early last week as investors dumped risky assets on fears about aggressive Federal Reserve rate hikes to cool red hot inflation.

On Tuesday, cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase Global Inc said it was slashing 1,000 jobs, or 10% of its workforce.

BitOasis was founded in Dubai in 2015 and serves English and Arabic speaking customers in the Gulf.

"Earlier this week, nine employees were made redundant across offices in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Amman," its CEO and co-founder Ola Doudin said in an email.

A spokesperson for the company said this represented nearly 5% of the company's workforce.

In 2021, BitOasis received permission to operate a Multilateral Trading Facility from the Abu Dhabi Global Market and is registered as a Virtual Asset Service Provider with the Financial Intelligence Unit of the UAE central bank.

BitOasis received provisional approval from Dubai's Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA) in March 2022.

(Reporting by Saeed Azhar; Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise)