The Office of the Regulator of the Individual Investor Programme this week published the Maltese government’s Fifth Annual Report on the Malta Citizenship by Investment Programme, also known as the Malta Individual Investor Programme (MIIP). The report covers a 12-month period from July 1st, 2017 to 30th June, 2018.
Since its inception, the programme has generated close to €1 billion in revenue, and as is confirmed in the report, it continues to garner substantial interest internationally. The report offers insight on the manner and amount of applications received, rejections, approvals, naturalisations, and also gives a comprehensive analysis on investments, contributions and fees.
Applications Submitted for the Malta Citizenship by Investment Programme
For the period in question, applications submitted for the Malta Citizenship by Investment Programme totalled 330, with November 2017 yielding the most applications - 38, followed by September 2017 - 37. Overall, the total number of applications received since the programme’s launch, as of June 2018, now tally up to a considerable 1431.
In line with the trend observed in previous years, the majority of applicants (79%) remain male, while females submitted 21% of applications received. As has also been the tendency in preceding years, the largest number of main applicants originated from Europe and Asia, with the former making up 42% of applications received and the latter 32%. Indeed, Asia can be signalled out as the region which has been seeing a constant significant increase in interest over the years. Other regions from which applicants originated include the Middle East, Africa, and North America.
With regards to dependants, 818 were included in the 2017-2018 period, 243 of which were spouses, 398 minor dependants, and 177 adult dependants (either adult children or parents/grandparents). The number of dependants included per application is that of 2.47, in slight contrast to the number recorded in previous years (3 dependants).
Malta Citizenship Programme Statistics 2018 - Outcome of the Applications
The amount of applications which were approved, implying that the due diligence has been positively concluded and a letter of approval in principle has been issued was 233, bringing the total number of approvals since 2014 to 961.
On the other hand, the rejection rate of the programme stood at 25% during this period, as 75 applications were either rejected or withdrawn. This represents a 16% increase from last year’s rejection rate. If anything, this shadows the paramount importance attributed to the programme’s thorough due diligence process. The average rate of applications which have not been approved since inception now comes to 19.5%.
Naturalisation of Malta Citizenship Programme Applicants
During the period analysed, 266 applications made it to the naturalisation stage, compared to the 137 naturalised applicants in the previous period. In aggregate, 833 main applicants have been naturalised since the launch of the programme.
Investments carried out by Applicants
Looking at property investments, similar to previous years, the majority for this period- 91%- were leased while the remaining 9% were purchased. In total, 266 properties were either leased or purchased. The most popular localities for both leasing and purchase were Sliema and St Julian's.
For this period, the average value for the purchased properties rounds up to €1,184,020 per property while leasing prices translate into an average of €19,139.16 per lease.
The amount invested in Government stocks between July 2017 and June 2018 totalled €39,991,242.79.
Contributions received under the Malta Citizenship by Investment Programme
During the period under review, financial contributions amounted to €159 million to the National Development and Social Fund; €68 million to the Consolidated Fund; €11 million to the Identity Malta Agency and €9 million to the concessionaire. The total contribution by the applicant of the MIIP for this period is estimated at €246,088,758 which is equivalent to 2.09% of the GDP.
Malta Citizenship Quota
As is specified in the Malta Citizenship Programme regulations, the number of successful main applicants is capped at 1,800 for the whole duration of the programme. As of now, 46.3% of this Malta citizenship quota has been met.
