On Friday morning, the glamorous crypto conference Token2049 Dubai, which was scheduled for late April, announced in a statement that it would not occur until 2027 amidst the war in the Middle East. On March 6, organizers had informed that the event would proceed as planned, despite a week of intensifying conflict in the region.
The conference stated that it made the decision because of “ongoing uncertainty in the region and its effect on safety, international travel, and logistics,” as per the statement.
Token2049 is not the first event to be canceled during the violence in the region. Several other events, including an entrepreneurship and innovation conference in Dubai and Abu Dhabi called the Megacampus Summit, were also shut down. Sporting events were also canceled, most notably after tennis star Daniil Medvedev was stranded in Dubai following a tournament.
After the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on February 28, violence spread to other parts of the Middle East. A suspected airstrike partially damaged Dubai’s main airport, and four people were injured when missile debris fell on Palm Jumeirah, a Dubai island full of luxury hotels.
When Token2049 organizers told a Telegram group of its ticket holders on Sunday that the event was going ahead as planned, someone replied in the chat, “What are you talking about. Iran is still hitting the Dubai airport,” according to reporting by the Wall Street Journal.
In 2025, over 15,000 people attended the conference, and the organizers described it as a “festival-like environment.” Some of the headline speakers scheduled for this year’s conference were Eric Trump, Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan, and Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino.