American media: Portugal's "Gold Visa", Chinese customers decreased sharply

Bloomberg reported on August 3 that the original topic: China's super rich is losing their favorite European "hidden route" sub -question: Americans who use the Portuguese "golden visa" project for the first time surpassed the Chinese for some Chinese rich people, for some rich Chinese, Portugal can provide many things: mild weather, leisurely and affordable lifestyle, and investor visas allowed to enter EU countries -only 350,000 euros. Over the past ten years, this propaganda has attracted thousands of Chinese people and helped reshape the city's city landscape, becoming part of the new wave of new funds reaching a peak of US $ 1 billion in 2014. But 8 years later (today), this wave is exhausted.

The "golden visa" project, which was once regarded as the "hidden route", has now encountered more obstacles set up from Portugal and China. The European Union has increasingly expressed their disdain for the projects that obtain residency through investment. At present, 10 EU member states provide such projects. Among them, Cyprus and Malta have canceled the "golden visa" plan after being reviewed by the EU. At present, Portugal's application process requires interviews, and China's epidemic prevention and control travel restrictions make it almost impossible. This dual pressure is making this popular project at stake throughout the European continent. Chinese investors will not be the first group in 2022 to obtain the most "golden visa" group in Portugal.

After receiving the EU assistance in 2011, Portugal designed the visa project to repair public finances. This brings the country's largest wave of investment ever. Thousands of rich Chinese have obtained Portuguese residence through the "golden visa". Since 2012, the country has issued about 10,000 investment visas, and most of them have been obtained by Chinese citizens. But so far this year, only 16%of success applicants are Chinese, far lower than 81%in 2014.

Since this year, Portugal has implemented restrictions on the implementation of "golden visas" in Lisbon, Porto and densely populated coastal areas to push investment to underdeveloped rural areas. Data from the first Taiping Davis of the real estate consulting company shows that the "golden visa" now accounts for only 3%of Portugal's real estate transaction. Investment immigration consultants said that at the same time, relevant Chinese government departments also set up some subtle obstacles, such as delayed updating passports.

Santos, a partner of Alpac Capital invested in Portugal, said that few people initially questioned the Chinese (to Portugal) investment operations. But as the United States is increasingly regarding China as a competitor, China's investment has attracted more attention. (Author Black Schmidt, etc., translated by Ding Yan)

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