How Many Countries Give Citizenship by investment?

A Growing number of small and big countries offer instant citizenship for investments from day one. How many citizenship by investment schemes are there?

Prospects who are interested in citizenship, want to know just how many citizenship by investment programs are there. This is very important to build trust and confidently apply for the programs. Quite often this could be confusing to many as there are no accurate list around.

We have compiled full list of both official and unofficial programs, also active and suspended ones. Please refer to  all the citizenship investment legislations and acts.

Firstly you should know citizenship by investment programs offer immediate passports within few months in exchange for donating to a state or buying a real estate. All other conditions such as residence, living, language, military service, language tests are waived.  All other programs that dont meet the above conditions are simply naturalization schemes.

Checkout these 15 nations that offer official citizenship by investment programs for investing. Of these six of them are microstates

Official

There are 15 citizenship by investment programs officially running, others are suspended or closed. All together these schemes pocket $5 billion annually granting citizenships for investing. These programs are founded and backed by CBI legislations and acts making them official.

Caribbean

1. Antigua and Barbuda – USD 100,000 (Donation) or USD 200,000 (Real Estate)
2. Dominica – USD 100,000 (Donation) or USD 200,000 (Real Estate)
3. Grenada – USD 150,000 (Donation) or USD 200,000 (Real Estate)
4. Saint Lucia – USD 100,000 (Donation) or USD 300,000 (Real Estate)
5. St Kitts and Nevis – USD 150,000 (Donation) or USD 200,000 (Real Estate)

Europe

1. Bulgaria – EUR 1 million (Govt bonds)
2. Malta – EUR 900,000 (Donation + Stocks)
3. Montenegro – EUR 250,000 (Real Estate) (to be suspended from 2022)
4. Turkey – USD 250,000  (Real Estate)

Middle East

1. Egypt  – USD 250,000 (donation) or USD 500,000 (real estate)
2. Jordan – USD 1.5 million (Bank deposit / Govt bonds)
3. UAE – TBA – Citizenship by Real estate investment

Pacific

1. Vanuatu – USD 130,000 (donation)
2. Samoa – USD 1.2 million (business with job creation)

Unofficial

These are unofficial citizenship for investment programs.

1. Austria – EUR 10 million (business investment)
2. North Macedonia – EUR 200,000 (donation) or EUR 400,000 (business with job creation)
3. Cambodia – USD 250,000 (donation) or USD1.5 million (business)
4. Romania – EUR 1 million (job creation business)

Suspended / Closed

1. Moldova – EUR 100,000 (donation)
2. Cyprus – EUR 2 million (real estate)
3. Comoros – EUR 40,000 (donation)
4. Bulgaria – EUR 1,000,000

Past

In the past, a number of countries have operated economic citizenship by investment programs. Many of these were popular during 1990’s some thirty years ago when offshore tax havens became popular. After 9/11 these schemes went into oblivion.

1. Tonga
2. Nauru
3. Marshall Islands
4.  Ireland
5.  Comoros

You can also see the infographic on history of citizenship by investment

Upcoming

These countries could launch a new citizenship by investment program in the future.

1. Solomon Islands
2. Croatia
3. Mauritius
4. Serbia
5. Albania
6. Russia

The full list is available here

Fake

You should watch out for any fake citizenship by investment schemes especially from Africa or South America. There are no such such schemes running in these countries. It is impossible to naturalize for citizenship in these countries without actually living there.

1. Nicaragua
2. Guatemala
3. Mexico
4. Belize
5. Panama
6. Dominican Republic

Full list here

We hope our compilation gives you a pretty good picture on investment citizenship schemes around the world. Our advice is you can go ahead with full confidence applying for all official schemes without the fear of losing money.