Proposed European legislation to end investment-based citizenship

Proposed European legislation to end investment-based citizenship

A statement from Belalgarve Consultants

A recent vote in the European Parliament has put both investment-based citizenship (CIP or Golden Passports) and investment-based residence permit (RBI or Golden Visa) programs under pressure. Other countries, namely the US, are also promising to end these programs.

Political opponents of these programs are wrongly using the conflict in Ukraine to advance their political agenda. Most, if not all, of these programs already refuse applications from Russian citizens, regardless of their political opinion.

At Belalgarve, we fully agree that thorough background checks should be carried out on any application for CIP or RBI, both on the individual (and dependent family members) and the provenance of the investment funds used. But laws that discriminate against people purely on the basis of their nationality are unacceptable. And unfounded:

• Only 5 to 7% of the awarded CIB and RBI applicants were Russian. The applicants who may have posed a security risk to any of these countries, or the European Union as a whole, can be numbered on one hand and could have been avoided with better due diligence procedures (or by sticking to those that already exist).
• The vast majority of applicants strive for better mobility, either to do business or to provide a better future for themselves or their families. Migration investors who were involved in money laundering or espionage for their authoritarian regimes were very exceptional cases and should be treated as such.
• The contribution of migration investments to the economy of the host country is important, and in some host countries enormous.

At Belalgarve, we are committed to continuing to help and support migration investors, regardless of their nationality. We see it as our mission to remove useless mobility barriers and help this world move towards more freedom instead of returning to an unfree world. We will therefore step up our efforts by

• lobbying for the continuation of this legal form of migration
• exploring and promoting alternative options for legal, investment-based migration
• support migration investors affected by recent discriminatory legislative proposals.

In the meantime, we invite all future migration investors to take their next steps as soon as possible to avoid complications. In the event of any complications or discrimination-based application denials, we will do our utmost to resolve them.

Always at your service,

Ralf Medernach

Founder

Belalgarve Consultants

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