The 'Golden Visa' Story

This story came out of N-TV this morning in Germany and has a curious twist to it.

Generally....to get a visa into any EU country....there are some written procedures and it's not a simple process....unless you claim asylum or migration issues.  If you were some wealthy Turk, or some high-political South Korean guy, or some corrupt Brazilian guy....you'd have problems getting such a visa.

So....someone came up to notice that Portugal has found various ways to allow non-EU folks to gain citizenship.  In the cases noted in this report....some Brazilian businessmen simply walked in and paid cash sums to get the visa.

More or less, it's just a copy of what has been going on in Cyprus.

The going rate for Portugal?  You come in and buy 500k Euro of property, and you get a visa.  Hold the property for five years, you go to the second tier.....full-up citizenship.  No, you don't have to give up your original citizenship.

Accusations of money-laundering in this process?  Well...it comes up.  For these businessmen involved in the Portugal episode....money was shifted around and it appears that Brazil may not have known about the money existing or had a chance to tax folks on the money.

Adding to the curious deal....Portugal even admits that a fair number of Chinese folks have entered the country via this program, and have visas....likely moving onto full-up citizenship five years later.  The N-TV folks even note that China has serious laws created that limit you to moving roughly 50k dollars a year in money....outside of the country.  How did all the Chinese come up with the 500k Euro to buy property?  That might be an interesting question to ask.

There must be tens of millions of Euro shifted around Europe each month in various money-laundering schemes for the purpose of getting visas or property acquisition lined up.  The EU folks?  Oddly, this isn't one of the hundred-odd things on their 'to-do' list to regulate.  Journalists?  They get all hyped up because it's just unethical in their mind....not right.

If you look at the Portugal gimmick....it's rigged to push up urban property prices, with foreigners buying the property and driving those prices up.

The odds that almost every single EU country has such a 'golden-visa'?  That's the thing about it....you just sense that it's pretty well accepted now.