On Zerohedge: “Prime Minister Joseph Muscat admitted that the deal is designed to sell the product. Malta is struggling. It needs the money.”
The link to the full piece is below.
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By April 2013, Cyprus was desperate. Depositors in its collapsed banks were treated to high and tight haircuts. Its offshore financial industry, the mainstay breadwinner, had cratered. Cyprus needed money badly. So President Nikos Anastasiades, in office for only a couple of months, announced that the price of citizenship would be slashed to €3 million, but it would still be tied to investment in Cyprus. It was in part an olive branch he held out to Russians who’d stashed their money in the cesspools of corruption that were the Cypriot banks: they too would be eligible for citizenship if they’d lost at least €3 million.
But that era of tying citizenship to investment and residency is now over in the EU. Malta put it up for sale at 78% off! And you can buy it off the shelf and leave.
The Parliament of Malta passed legislation that set the price for Maltese citizenship at €650,000 for any non-EU applicant. It’s not linked to any residency or investment requirements. People can just come by, jump through some minor hoops, pay, get their citizenship and passport, and then settle in Germany or wherever. Simon Busuttil, leader of the opposition Nationalist Party, warned that Malta could end up being compared to shady tax havens in the Caribbean.
Prime Minister Joseph Muscat admitted that the deal was designed to sell the product. Malta is struggling. It needs the money. He claimed that about 45 people would end up buying citizenship during the first year, for about €30 million in revenues.
No big deal? Henley and Partners, an international consulting group, was awarded the contract to run the program. The firm specializes “in residence and citizenship planning,” for “wealthy individuals and families, as well as their advisors worldwide.” CEO Eric Major claimed that the program would be transparent. But unlike the Prime Minister, Mr. Major estimated that Malta would sell between 200 and 300 citizenships per year. Hence, at the upper range, nearly €200 million in annual revenues – not bad for a little bit of paperwork. And a lot of money for such a small place.
And if the product really takes off? The price point is advantageous, given what Cyprus charges, and there are hundreds of millions of well-to-do but not super-rich Chinese, Indians, and others who would like to establish an escape route. This could be Europe’s next big thing. It could be HUGE!
But it’s competitive out there, as Cyprus found out. The Maltese government said that other EU countries were also considering the outright sale of citizenship. This can mean only one thing: downward pressure on prices.
Will Greece offer citizenship for €599,000 each? Perhaps, no questions asked, to be even more competitive? It’s going to be what the bailout Troika and everyone else have been looking for: a phenomenally profitable export product with minuscule input costs and unlimited potential. If it sold 1 million citizenships over the next three years at this price, it would be able to pay off all its debts, bail out its banks properly, allow politicians and tycoons to syphon off €100 billion for personal gain, and still have some cash left to buy some German tanks and frigates. Debt crisis solved!
Unless Slovakia jumps in and cuts the price to €399,000 a piece….
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http://www.zerohedge.com/contributed/2013-11-14/eu-citizenship-goes-sale-price-war-breaks-out?page=1
Of course it’s designed to sell the “product” – what a debasement – also known as our citizenship, something some people have had to wait years for.
In fact, it is pretty much an “executive package” product, designed with a first class twist to it “Come on in. Spend this amount of money and we’ll give you the red carpet to the world.”
Of course it could be huge, and probably our PM’s plan is that it will be huge.
The scheme is scandalous, but the EU Commission’s final stand on this so-called investment scheme has been highly disappointing.
Their so-called “agreement” reached with the Maltese government does not reflect the condemnation by the EU Parliament, and it also seems that they did not smell one little bit the “hugeness” that all this fake investment could result in.
On a related argument.
Working on the assumption that Slovakia will not cut the price, Joseph Muscat has predicted that with his “elf miljun ewro” (one billion euros), Malta will in 5 years achieve the level of economic development it would normally make in 15 years.
Something tells me that if this were to happen, then by the time of the next general elections, Malta would no longer qualify for funds under several EU programs, and Malta may well become a net contributor to the EU budget.
So whilst Muscat milks the fat EU passports cow, the EU funds cow will be starved to death. Now this makes me shudder. Will Joseph Muscat be pulling the plug on Malta’s membership of the EU as soon as this happens?
I hope so. All our Russian and Chinese cousins forced to come and actually live here.
X’elf miljun Ciccio, dawn jekk idahhlu 30 miljun dis-sena jiccelebraw.
Ghandna biex niftahru.
Ghandna gvern qahhab.
Gvern li lest iqahhab pajjizu.
M’hemmx fejn tasal izjed.
Ilhaqna il-qiegh.
The only advantage of reaching rock bottom is that there is only one way to go – up. However, I wouldn’t bet on it. If there is one skill that Labour has it’s the ability to dream up something that will plunge us even deeper.
‘..He claimed that about 45 people would end up buying citizenship during the first year, for about €30 million in revenues…’
And how, pray, does he intend to generate the economy with that amount?
This thing’s taken over and we’ve been left to our own devices.
Cuthroat island(s) – the movie that bankrupted Carolco
Pirates of the Caribbean – the real life story of Henley and partners in St Kitts and Nevis
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/12/us-passport-idUSTRE81B05A20120212
Kempadoo, who is developing a new resort called Kittitian Hill, worries that public-private partnerships such as Henley’s compromise the island’s sovereignty.
“They’re pirates of the Caribbean,” he says of companies handling the citizenship business. “The situation of the country predicates that they are open to citizenship by investment. St. Kitts’ debt is 180 percent of its GDP. How can the government say no?”
I was at the airport yesterday, just back from Istanbul, standing in queue at immigration control. A flight from Dubai had also landed just a few minutes after ours, so the queue was long, and unusually slow.
After waiting about ten minutes, and moving about 2 metres, a group of at least 15 Chinese teenagers walked past, dressed as you do if you have money to burn, some with their sunglasses still on.
They were being led by a suited airport/government official with a huge smile on his face. A counter had been specially opened just for them, and they were done with immigration control in next to no time.
No prizes for guessing what just happened.
If the original cap of 1,800 citizenship applications still holds, at this rate Malta will be getting close to 30,000 new citizens soon.
And 25,000 euros for a passport AND VIP treatment? That’s a pretty sweet deal.
Yesterday at 4.50pm at Dingli Cliffs (near the chapel) a white Paramount Garage mini-bus unloaded a group of extremely well dressed Chinese-looking visitors. While they went to take a panoramic look the driver stood behind the van all the time looking anxiously around as if he expected journalists to show up at any time to quiz him about his passengers. When I left five minutes later the wealthy-looking visitors, who included also women, were returning to the mini-bus.
Selling our birthright for a sum of money is morally and fundamentally wrong. it is a huge retrograde step and will certainly not provide an answer to the long term problems that the Prime Minister is steering the economy into. Hard work and sustainable planning it seems are being substituted for one off gains on both sides of our balance sheet. Rising unemployment figures, month after month, is already an indicator that all is not right.
Our ‘new citizens’ will have nothing other than a 5 year investment to tie them to Malta and the flow of their so called investments WILL eventually be reversed leaving us with a huge problem to solve when this happens. And who be asked to underwrite this reversal? The real citizens of Malta, you and me of course!
The pity is that Cyprus has already tried this a modified version of this model and the damage that the inflow of Russian ‘investment’ money, has had on the country is there to for all to see, except it seems, our Prime Minister.
But then again, Joseph Muscat had advised Lawrence Gonzi to follow Cyprus’s lead. So he continues to be true to form. Alas for all of Malta.
Malta is “struggling” BECAUSE Joseph Muscat is prime minister, We are struggling as a result of all the wrong decisions taken by him and his government.
Till a year ago, with Dr. Gonzi as Prime Minister, Malta was sailing smoothly in very rough seas while other countries were really struggling.
Now Malta has to struggle in much calmer waters.
Could it be that the captain of the ship makes all the difference? A good captain manages to steer his ship forward even in treacherous waters and a mutiny on his hands.