Verified biographical information and materials for editorial and programme use.
All details confirmed as of October 2026.
Verified Facts — For Editorial Use
| Public name | Safi Ghauri |
| Legal name variant | Safiullah Ghauri / Barrister Safi Ullah Ghauri (historical Pakistani legal records) |
| Title | General Counsel (InvoiceMate, Tharwa Finance, The Game Company, Klink Finance, M20 Chain, OpenSpace Africa) | Managing Partner, Esquare Legal | Partner, Tahota Law Firm |
| Base | Dubai, UAE | also São Paulo and Islamabad |
| Regulatory record | One of Dubai's earliest VARA VASP licences (Fasset) | Pakistan's first BNPL licence, SECP 2021 (QisstPay) | Represents the world's second-largest crypto exchange and several leading fintechs before PVARA |
| Qualified as | Called to the Bar of England & Wales — Lincoln's Inn, 2008 | Licensed to practise — UAE, Pakistan, Brazil |
| Education | LLM — City St George's, University of London | LLB (Hons) — University of London | FinTech Law & Policy — Duke University |
| National security training | National Security Workshop — National Defense University of Pakistan |
| Recent speaking | Speaker, Web3Experts Brazil, São Paulo, June 2026 | Workshop Speaker, NIC Islamabad (Ministry of IT & Telecom / Ignite) — South American Market Entry for Tech Startups, June 2026 | Speaker, Horasis Global Summit, São Paulo (2025) | Panellist, DARTE European Commission + UNIDROIT (2026) |
| Broadcast record | 300+ broadcast appearances | Pakistan TV South America Correspondent | Commentary in English and Urdu |
| Primary contact | safighauri@esquarelegal.com |
Bios — Ready for Editorial Use
Dubai-based General Counsel to digital-asset and frontier-technology companies, Barrister, and Managing Partner of Esquare Legal, with a parallel record as a geopolitical analyst across MENA, South Asia and Latin America.
Safi Ghauri is a Dubai-based General Counsel to digital-asset and frontier-technology companies and Managing Partner of Esquare Legal, a crypto-native law firm with teams in the UAE, Brazil, Pakistan and China. Called to the Bar of England & Wales at Lincoln's Inn and licensed to practise in the UAE, Pakistan and Brazil, he is also a Partner of Tahota Law Firm and a geopolitical analyst with over 300 broadcast appearances, cited by The Independent (UK), Bloomberg Arabic, CNA and Reuters.
Safi Ghauri is a Dubai-based General Counsel to digital-asset and frontier-technology companies, with 18 years in licensing, regulation, capital markets and disputes. He heads the legal function at InvoiceMate, Tharwa Finance and The Game Company, two of them on the UAE Future 100 list, and represents the world's second-largest crypto exchange before Pakistan's Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority. Earlier, he built the legal and compliance base behind Fasset's VARA licence and Series A, and secured Pakistan's first BNPL licence from the SECP for QisstPay. He is Managing Partner of Esquare Legal, the UAE-licensed, Dubai-headquartered crypto-native firm he founded in 2009, and a Partner of Tahota Law Firm. His litigation record includes Pakistan's largest defamation award (PKR 100 million) and a cryptocurrency matter won before the Supreme Court of India, and he acted for the Chinese investors in the USD 4.2 billion RUDA project. Called to the Bar of England & Wales at Lincoln's Inn and licensed to practise in the UAE, Pakistan and Brazil, he trained at Clyde & Co in London. He is also a geopolitical analyst with over 300 broadcast appearances and Pakistan TV's South America Correspondent, has spoken at Horasis, COP30 and the European Commission and UNIDROIT's DARTE series, and is a UNODC master trainer on crypto crime and terrorist financing.
Headshots
Download Approved Headshots →