news – Saint Lucia Economic Citizenship Investment Programme

Change in Qualifying Investment Prices

slucip — Sat, 20 Jul 2024 19:11:16 +0000

Effective July 1st, 2024, in keeping with the Memorandum of Agreement signed between all 5 countries within the OECS who operate Citizenship by Investment Programmes, the Government of Saint Lucia has made changes to the qualifying investment prices. Attached is the memo.

CIP Saint Lucia – Changes in Qualifying Investments Download

COVID-19 Relief Bond: Minimum investment US $250,000

slucip — Wed, 10 Jun 2020 18:27:50 +0000

The creation of this special COVID-19 Relief Bond starting at USD 250,000 is a non-interest-bearing government bond to which no processing fee is payable by the applicant. The bond must be registered and remain in the name of the applicant from the date of first issue. This bond option is available for a limited time up to December 31, 2020.An administrative fee of US $30,000 is payable by the applicant once the application for citizenshiphave been granted. There after the qualifying investment sum for this special bond option is payable as follows:

Sole applicant (5 years holding bond): US$250,000
Applicant applying with 1 qualifying dependent (6 year holding bond): US$250,000
Applicant applying with up to 4 qualifying dependents (7 year holding bond): US$250,000
Applicant applying with up to 4 qualifying dependents (5 year holding bond): US$300,000
Each additional qualifying dependent along with an applicant applying with up to 4 qualifying dependents: US$15,000

Applications by a Qualifying Dependent

slucip — Thu, 06 Jun 2019 20:05:56 +0000

Memorandum- Reinstatement of Bond Option Under CIP Saint Lucia

slucip — Wed, 05 Apr 2017 17:39:12 +0000

How to get a second passport: “Citizenship by investment” is booming

slucip — Fri, 19 Aug 2016 21:37:16 +0000

Second passports have always been in demand by those living in turbulent geographies. They offer a convenient alternative should circumstances deteriorate to the point where relocation becomes the best option. Most countries see the benefit of acquiring new wealthy taxpayers and their capital, so “citizenship by investment” is nothing new. But as uncertainty grows in a world battling to find a new way, competition for those with skills is being matched by their desire for a Plan B. – Alec Hogg

By Vanessa Houlder

When Younghee Wait, a New Yorker and US citizen, took her family to Malta last November, they were enchanted by the Mediterranean archipelago’s beauty and culture. “My whole family fell in love with what Malta has to offer,” she says. But the visit was more than a holiday. It was a step towards buying Maltese citizenship for her family, which would allow them to live and work in any part of the EU.

Ms Wait exemplifies a new and fast-growing class of “economic citizens”. At one time, second passports were – like suitcases of cash – the preserve of spy novels. Now they are becoming increasingly common, according to the International Monetary Fund.

The fund has reported a surge in the number of economic citizenship programmes. Wealthy individuals see buying citizenship or residency rights “as a means to improving international mobility, tax planning, and family security”, the IMF said in a report last year.

There are no tax advantages for Ms Wait’s family in acquiring Maltese passports, but it would open the door to a job in Europe. She says: “Some people say you can travel everywhere with an American passport but it does not give you the flexibility to live and work in other countries. If one wishes to work abroad and live life as a productive, engaged individual, one has to consider acquiring a citizenship or arranging for a work permit.”

While she and her husband relied on the banks they worked for to arrange visas, she believes today’s more entrepreneurial companies are not geared to helping employees work abroad.

Ms Wait, who expects to complete the process for gaining “citizenship by investment” this year, describes it as rigorous and time-consuming, involving extensive background checks. The required investment is significant: the main applicant pays €650,000 with additional investments in property and bonds and further contributions for spouses and dependants.

Malta’s citizenship-by-investment programme is controversial. In 2014, Members of the European Parliament voted overwhelmingly in favour of a non-binding resolution criticising the scheme, saying an EU passport should not carry a “price tag”. In April this year, a report by Maltese MPs cast fresh criticism of the way the contract for the citizenship programme was awarded.

Despite such reservations, the EU has boosted the sale of citizenships by offering a number of Caribbean countries visa-free travel in Europe, starting in 2009. The move injected life into one of the oldest – but largely moribund – citizenship programmes, which had been run by St Kitts and Nevis since 1984.

The two Caribbean islands promise “intoxicating natural beauty, sunny skies, warm waters, and white sandy beaches” but its new citizens are not required to live there or even visit them. For an investment of as little as $250,000, investors have been able to secure visa-free travel to dozens of countries in a matter of months.

Take-up quickly soared, pushing receipts to 13 per cent of the islands’ $787m national income in 2013. With the minimal regulations and tax burdens, libertarians were among early enthusiasts. One such was Roger Ver, an early investor in bitcoin-related start-ups who was often pictured wearing a T-shirt featuring the slogan “borders are imaginary lines”. Another,Pavel Durov, a peripatetic Russian-born technology entrepreneur, says he does not like the concept of countries.

Accurate statistics are in short supply, but the IMF has suggested that demand for citizenship-by-investment programmes is led by clients from China, followed by Russia, and to a lesser extent from the Middle East. It says the surge in demand “may reflect a combination of growing wealth in emerging markets and an increase in global uncertainties and security issues”.

Views differ on the implications for such programmes of the UK’s vote to leave the EU. Nuri Katz, president of Apex Capital Partners, a citizenship consultancy, predicts the result will have a “huge impact” on European programmes that have been marketed as a cheaper, faster back door into the UK. But Christian Kalin of Henley & Partners, a Jersey-based consultancy, believes Brexit will have “little if any effect on our business”. He thinks British citizens will continue to have access to the EU in a relationship similar to that of the Norwegians and Swiss.

Insecurity fuels demand, says Mr Kalin. Some purchasers of second passports are wary of revealing their nationality on passenger lists or hotel registers, in the wake of the 2008 Mumbaiterrorist attacks, in which US and UK passport holders were singled out.

Tax is another incentive. Henley says that moving “to a country with a milder tax regime is an attractive option for many who feel they have to pay more than a fair share, and who in particular do not like the divisive politics and constant erosion of their privacy”.

Residency – not citizenship – usually determines where people pay tax, except for US citizens who pay federal taxes wherever they live. But Henley says citizenship may be a tiebreaker when more than one country may have taxing rights and “is therefore increasingly important as an effective tool for international tax planning”. Acquiring a new passport can also be valuable for the small but growing number of US citizens who are relinquishing their US citizenship because of the compliance burden and increased enforcement of US tax rules.

Greater visa-free travel is another big selling point for the super-rich, according to Mr Katz. He cites an example of a South African wanting to have dinner in Paris without impediment, but who would need a visa to travel to many places. Only a second passport can bestow certain freedoms that westerners take for granted, he says. “Psychologically, for a high-net-worth person [to] have to ask someone to let [them] go somewhere is very upsetting.”

Increasingly, additional passports are seen as a status symbol. Mr Katz cites what he describes as “the black American Express syndrome”, a steel invitation-only card which conveys membership of a club of big spenders. He says: “For some people having another citizenship is prestigious.”

Atossa Araxia Abrahamian, a journalist at Al Jazeera and author of The Cosmopolites, a book about the sale of citizenships, thinks that effective marketing accounts for much of its rise in popularity. She says it is partly down to the “leveraging of paranoia” and partly the skilful framing of the transaction as in Henley’s description of its clients as a “privileged new class of global citizens”.

The reputation of some schemes has been tarnished by lax controls. The IMF says “preserving the credibility” of programmes is perhaps the most critical challenge they face.

Ms Abrahamian, who has three citizenships through family or birth, says she sees nothing wrong with the investment programmes. “If you are wealthy and want to take matters into your own hands, more power to you.”

Ms Wait views her family’s passports acquisition as a transaction needing as much careful analysis as any other decision regarding her family’s wealth. “For me, citizenship is a category of alternative asset investment such as an insurance or options trading.”

Suspension of the Bond Option under CIP Saint Lucia

slucip — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 20:39:04 +0000

Government of Saint Lucia Announces World Class Resort and Lifestyle Development Project

slucip — Tue, 02 Aug 2016 20:47:37 +0000

Saint Lucia will become home to one of the Caribbean’s iconic resort and lifestyle developments after Prime Minister Hon. Allen Chastanet signed an agreement today to build the island nation’s first and only international standard integrated development.

The ‘Pearl of the Caribbean’ is valued at over USD2.6 billion and occupies a 700-acre site to the south of the island. The project will comprise a marina, a racecourse, a resort and shopping mall complex, casino, Free Trade Zone, extensive entertainment and leisure facilities, eco-tourism as well as architecturally designed villas and apartments. Overall, the Pearl of the Caribbean Development is designed to be a well-balanced project with open space making up over 50% of the overall development. It is designed to be a sustainable and self-contained development and is expected to generate between 500 to 800 jobs in construction during its initial phase of implementation.

The agreement was signed by the Government of Saint Lucia and the project’s Master Developer DSH Caribbean Star Limited in Saint Lucia and construction of the initial phase of the project is set to commence in 2017. Today’s signing marks a significant milestone in the three (3) years of negotiations between DSH Caribbean Star Limited and key agencies of the Government of Saint Lucia including Invest Saint Lucia (ISL), the Citizenship by Investment Unit (CIU) and the Development Control Authority (DCA).

The Pearl of the Caribbean is also set to play a lead role in the development of a new horse industry in Saint Lucia, proving a new tourism and entertainment option for international tourists as well as new employment opportunities for locals. Upon completion, the project will be able to house more than 1,000 racehorses and have the capacity to hold feature racing carnivals, establishing Saint Lucia as a racing and entertainment centre in the Caribbean and leveraging off the international appeal of the sport to promote Saint Lucia to a diverse audience base.

The announcement of the Pearl of the Caribbean is the latest high profile step in Saint Lucia’s drive to create new industry and bring in new investments. Today’s signing follows on from the government’s launch of the Saint Lucia Citizenship by Investment Programme in January 2016 and confirmation of the extensive upgrading of the Hewanorra International Airport which is located only two kilometres from the Pearl of the Caribbean development.

The objective of the Master Plan proposal is to create a new tourism district targeting not just the short term visitors to Saint Lucia but investors in the properties such as the Homestead Villas, waterfront Villas and other commercial properties.

The Pearl of the Caribbean is expected to appeal to international investors, especially in emerging markets like China, South East Asia and Russia. “The Pearl of the Caribbean” proves high quality investment opportunities and resort style living on an island famed for its unspoilt beauty, pristine beaches and World Heritage sites. Investment opportunities in this project also qualify for Saint Lucia’s Citizenship by Investment Programme.

China’s booming investment and outbound tourism sectors have significantly boosted economies across Europe, North America, South East Asia and Australasia over the last decade. In 2015 the World Travel and Tourism Council stated that Chinese outbound tourists spent a staggering USD215 billion, a 53 percent increase on the USD140 billion spent in 2014.

DSH Caribbean Star Limited is an affiliate of Desert Star Holdings Limited, a Hong Kong based registered management and investment company with international investments in commercial and equine property. Last month Desert Star Holdings and a joint venture partner signed two significant agreements in China to kick start a commercial breeding industry in Ordos, Inner Mongolia and to manage the country’s premier racecourse, Ordos Yiqi Racecourse, in the same region. It is estimated that China’s horse industry has the potential to generate up to USD2 billion in direct economic benefits over the next decade. The total direct and indirect economic impact of a commercial equine industry on the Chinese economy may be as much as USD8 billion which includes the creation of 34,000 new jobs. The first notable event held in China since this announcement will be the CECF Ordos (20-21 August), an event founded by the China Horse Club.

DSH Caribbean Star Limited is also affiliated with the China Horse Club, a leading lifestyle, business and thoroughbred racing club which has extensive ties with leading international participants in the horse racing industry including Coolmore (Ireland, USA, Australia), WinStar Farm (USA), Sheikh Fahad’s Qatar Racing (Britain), Newgate Farm (Australia), SF Bloodstock (USA, Australia, Europe), Vinery Stud (Australia), Sheikh Mohammed Bin Khalifa Al Maktoum (Dubai), Barbara Banke (USA), Ananda Krishnan (Malaysia) and Markus Jooste (South Africa) among others.

Saint Lucia Economic Citizenship Programme Officially Opens

slucip — Fri, 01 Jan 2016 21:46:16 +0000

Saint Lucia started accepting applications for citizenship by investment from January 1, 2016.

This follows an announcement made by Prime Minister Dr Kenny Anthony during his opening address to the Global Citizens Forum in Monaco last October.

Dr Anthony described himself as a jealous guardian of Saint Lucian citizenship, but noted the time had come to think beyond traditional approaches in order to deal with the challenges that small states face. Citizenship through investment, he said, has become a viable alternative.

The Prime Minister informed the gathering of citizenship lawyers, wealth managers, marketing agents, investors and VIPs that Saint Lucia, by accepting new citizens, would not just be offering citizenship but would be offering an identity, a people, and Saint Lucia’s place in the world.

He stressed that new citizens must enhance Saint Lucia’s global standing and ensure that the country’s proud heritage endures.

The Prime Minister also outlined the principles and characteristics of the programme to be implemented. He noted the legislation establishing the programme was supported without political rancor, with the blessing of both the ruling government and opposition parties.

Saint Lucia Economic Citizenship Program launched at Bay Gardens Beach Resort

slucip — Wed, 30 Dec 2015 21:45:12 +0000

Mr. Nicholas John and Mrs. Leonne Theodore-John speaking with Deputy Prime Minister- Hon. Phillip J Pierre

The Citizenship by Investment Program (CIP) is now officially under way. Government has started accepting applications from January 1, as earlier indicated.

Launched at the Bay Gardens hotel last week, the program heard from key players including Prime Minister Dr Kenny D. Anthony and Chairman of the CIP Board Dr Ernest Hilaire.

The Prime Minister, who first formally announced the program in Monaco at a Global Citizens Forum last October, said at the local launch that the program is to help stabilize the economy.

He said in the absence of an investment flow of more desirable proportions and following the worse financial crisis saint Lucia has known, new ways have to be found to bridge the financial and economic gaps.

The Prime Minister also noted that despite the opposition leader’s current criticism of the program, the legislation establishing it was supported in parliament without political rancor, with the blessing of both the government and opposition sides in parliament.

The program will seek to sell 500 economic citizenship passports in the first instance and the proceeds will be used to fund construction of the Castries-to-Gros Islet Highway.

CIP funds raised will also go towards construction of the new East Coast Highway linking Gros Islet to Vieux Fort through Babonneau.

Saint Lucia announces its first Citizenship by Investment programme in Monaco

slucip — Wed, 21 Oct 2015 21:30:38 +0000

Monaco – Saint Lucia’s first citizenship by investment programme was announced by the country’s Prime Minister & Minister for Finance, Economic Affairs, Planning & Social Security, Hon. Dr. Kenny D. Anthony the 3rd edition of the Global Citizen Forum hosted in Monaco.

The announcement will see foreigners for the first time gain citizenship and a Saint Lucian national passport through investment in the country’s economy. The legislation was supported by all elected members of parliament, and the country will commence accepting applications for citizenship by investment on January 1st, 2016.

Applicants will require a net worth of US$ 3,000,000 to qualify and Saint Lucia has set an initial limit of 500 applications per annum. A citizen of Saint Lucia will hold a passport that allows visa-free travel to 105 countries and has a Passport Power Rank of 45, according to Arton Capital’s Passport Power Index.

Armand Arton, CEO and Founder of Arton Capital, said: “This is a ground-breaking announcement for all global citizens and of course for the country of Saint Lucia. It will bring great benefits to Saint Lucia’s economy, with international investments set to increase dramatically, which will contribute greatly to the country’s national development.

“The announcement will allow high net worth individuals to access several benefits, such as visa free international travel to a large number of countries, increased security and flexibility while traveling, and it will act as an insurance in times of political or economic disorder elsewhere.”

Speaking at the Global Citizen Forum, Hon. Dr. Kenny D. Anthony, Prime Minister & Minister for Finance, Economic Affairs, Planning & Social Security said: “Saint Lucia is a remarkable country that contributes to world civilisation far beyond what is expected of our land size, population and gross domestic product. In some ways we have always been global citizens, we have given the world two Nobel Laureates, earning us the honour of having the highest number of Laureates per capita in the world.

“With this announcement, the country is now truly a member of the global citizen movement, and we look forward to welcoming our new countrymen and the positive impact they can make.”

Dr. Ernest Hilaire, Chairman, Citizenship by Investment Unit, added: “The exclusive new programme, permitting only 500 applicants per year, with a minimal net worth of US$ 3,000,000 distinguishes Saint Lucia from other programmes, and resonates with the country’s personable and luxurious surroundings.

“We are confident the new programme will provide a platform for strategic developmental reasons whilst attracting individuals who are best placed to invest in Saint Lucia.”

Considered the “Davos” of the global citizen industry, the Global Citizen Forum seeks to inspire change, provoke innovation, encourage engagement, and empower future generations during two days of debate and idea sharing. The event aims to nurture dialogue with government policymakers as they look to evolve political, social and economic responses to migration; to inspire change and uncover solutions to global causes; and, to explore new ways that global citizens can contribute to society.