This is great news overall. Whilst there were many differing opinions on this thread (at times less optimistic than warranted!), there was little to no chance the law was going to be passed with retro-active effect.
If anything, the governmentâs tactics of applying this law retro-actively created a lot of awareness of the programme ending, and may end up having the opposite effect increasing last minute applications.
The GV law has never mentioned citizenship. The citizenship law is separate and requires 5 years residence. However in Portugal, the residence is counted just based on the time you hold a residence card.
This is unlike many other countries where the naturalization itself requires a minimum of physical presence.
In Portugal, this is instead enforced by the type of residence you hold - most types of residence card require being in Portugal majority of the time to maintain (but GV is an exception).
I have a pre-approval. So will my investment now be looked through the lens of âis it entrepreneurialâ? Does another agency need to re-look and approve or reject it?
Iâm trying to figure that out too.
Unless property & funds are classed as âentrepreneurialâ then I read this a retrospective change for people like me part way through the process.
Yes, I know all that. The style of extensively referencing other statutes is somewhat obscure. So when it says something like âSĂŁo revogados a alĂnea d) do n.Âș 1 e os n.Âșs 2 a 4 do artigo 3.Âș, o artigo 90.Âș-A e a alĂnea r) do n.Âș 1 do artigo 122.Âș da Lei n.Âș 23/2007, de 4 de julho, na sua redação atualâ it isnât obvious on its face what is being repealed.
I am wondering about the same thingâif investments made that fulfil the new GV requirements that took effect in 2022 are protected.
I am also wondering if the current bill guarantees the ability of those with a pending application to renew the visa (GV or the new version) up to the 5 year mark.
Perhaps the creation of a special variant of the d2 visa allows the government to officially cancel the âgolden visaâ while not retroactively changing the deal? They call it entrepreneurial but in this case the existing investment is the âbusinessâ.
Suddenly the EU is off their back, rich GV holders are successfully scapegoated and the government gets a win, and GV holders dont get boned.
Looks like itâs all definitions related to the GV, and the exemption from needing a visa from the consulate to apply for the residence card:
https://www.pgdlisboa.pt/leis/lei_mostra_articulado.php?nid=920&tabela=leis
Artigo 3.Âș
DefiniçÔes
1 - Para efeitos da presente lei considera-se:
d) «Atividade de investimento» qualquer atividade exercida pessoalmente ou atravĂ©s de uma sociedade que conduza, em regra, Ă concretização de, pelo menos, uma das seguintes situaçÔes em territĂłrio nacional e por um perĂodo mĂnimo de cinco anos:
i) TransferĂȘncia de capitais no montante igual ou superior a 1,5 milhĂ”es de euros;
ii) Criação de, pelo menos, 10 postos de trabalho;
iii) Aquisição de bens imóveis de valor igual ou superior a (euro) 500 000;
iv) Aquisição de bens imĂłveis, cuja construção tenha sido concluĂda hĂĄ, pelo menos, 30 anos ou localizados em ĂĄrea de reabilitação urbana e realização de obras de reabilitação dos bens imĂłveis adquiridos, no montante global igual ou superior a (euro) 350 000;
v) TransferĂȘncia de capitais no montante igual ou superior a (euro) 500 000, que seja aplicado em atividades de investigação desenvolvidas por instituiçÔes pĂșblicas ou privadas de investigação cientĂfica, integradas no sistema cientĂfico e tecnolĂłgico nacional;
vi) TransferĂȘncia de capitais no montante igual ou superior a (euro) 250 000 euros, que seja aplicado em investimento ou apoio Ă produção artĂstica, recuperação ou manutenção do patrimĂłnio cultural nacional, atravĂ©s de serviços da administração direta central e perifĂ©rica, institutos pĂșblicos, entidades que integram o setor pĂșblico empresarial, fundaçÔes pĂșblicas, fundaçÔes privadas com estatuto de utilidade pĂșblica, entidades intermunicipais, entidades que integram o setor empresarial local, entidades associativas municipais e associaçÔes pĂșblicas culturais, que prossigam atribuiçÔes na ĂĄrea da produção artĂstica, recuperação ou manutenção do patrimĂłnio cultural nacional;
vii) TransferĂȘncia de capitais no montante igual ou superior a (euro) 500 000, destinados Ă aquisição de unidades de participação em fundos de investimento ou fundos de capitais de risco vocacionados para a capitalização de empresas, que sejam constituĂdos ao abrigo da legislação portuguesa, cuja maturidade, no momento do investimento, seja de, pelo menos, cinco anos e, pelo menos, 60 /prct. do valor dos investimentos seja concretizado em sociedades comerciais sediadas em territĂłrio nacional;
viii) TransferĂȘncia de capitais no montante igual ou superior a (euro) 500 000, destinados Ă constituição de uma sociedade comercial com sede em territĂłrio nacional, conjugada com a criação de cinco postos de trabalho permanentes, ou para reforço de capital social de uma sociedade comercial com sede em territĂłrio nacional, jĂĄ constituĂda, com a criação ou manutenção de postos de trabalho, com um mĂnimo de cinco permanentes, e por um perĂodo mĂnimo de trĂȘs anos;
2 - O montante ou requisito quantitativo mĂnimo das atividades de investimento previstas nas subalĂneas ii) a vi) da alĂnea d) do nĂșmero anterior podem ser inferiores em 20 /prct., quando as atividades sejam efetuadas em territĂłrios de baixa densidade.
3 - Para efeitos do disposto no nĂșmero anterior, consideram-se territĂłrios de baixa densidade os de nĂvel iii da Nomenclatura de Unidades Territoriais para Fins EstatĂsticos (NUTS III) com menos de 100 habitantes por Km2 ou um produto interno bruto (PIB) per capita inferior a 75 /prct. da mĂ©dia nacional.
4 - Os imĂłveis adquiridos nos termos previstos nas subalĂneas iii) e iv) da alĂnea d) do n.Âș 1 que se destinem a habitação, apenas permitem o acesso ao presente regime caso se situem nas RegiĂ”es AutĂłnomas dos Açores e da Madeira ou nos territĂłrios do interior, identificados no anexo Ă Portaria n.Âș 208/2017, de 13 de julho.
Artigo 122.Âș
Autorização de residĂȘncia com dispensa de visto de residĂȘncia
1 - NĂŁo carecem de visto para obtenção de autorização de residĂȘncia temporĂĄria os nacionais de Estados terceiros:
r) Que façam prova da atividade de investimento, nos termos a que se refere a alĂnea d) do artigo 3.Âș
Massive Win for everyone here!
Win Win Win! I donât think anyone has an issue with the current legislation.
Everyone accepted that the Republic has a right to scrape the program, as long as they honour their current commitments and donât do it in a manner that would ignore any pending applications. They did that.
+1 for Madalena. I know her. Sheâs a go-getter.
Thanks for the recommendation, @Garbonzo. Do you happen to know if Prime Legal also successfully handles citizenship applications for GV holders?
So⊠about where I figured weâd end up at the end of the day.
Costa and PS can go back to their base and say âwe triedâ and blame the process and the lawyers and courts and everyone but themselves for why they couldnât get everything they wanted. Comes at the cost of our fretting and acid-reflux but this is probably just how politics work there.
For us, reality reasserts itself and we can move on. Win.
The immigration-lawyer community will just pivot to selling HQA. they still have the recurring revenue of the renewals to tide them over.
Universities and research centers win because they get a cut of these new HQAs in various ways. Weâll call this a Good Thingâą.
Some few of those HQA startups might actually go somewhere and help Portugal. Probably not many, but > 0 certainly. Weâll call this a Good Thingâą too.
The fund managers canât grow, but they already have a bunch of funds they can get 2/20 off of so theyâre fine. And frankly the non-real-estate funds were having enough issues finding deal flow to put capital into anyway, so this isnât necessarily a bad thing. As @gavin3 has multiply noted, a lot of gov officials were looking askance at the real estate based funds for other reasons, so they knew they were in the crosshairs anyway.
The real estate industry loses the easy willing-to-overpay GV customers, but they have enough Americans on D7 willing to overpay so theyâre fine, and itâs not as if thereâs a ton of inventory to sell anyway.
Life goes on.
The biggest loser here is Mercan whose whole business model now collapses, but Iâm sure theyâll make hay while the sun shines and push through as many applicants as they can before the law changes. The rush of applicants will probably make Dec 2021 look like nothing. I wonder if weâll see multi-year pre-approvals.
Or maybe a miracle will happen, the re-classification as D2 will speed things up, and weâll actually get processed at the same speed as D7. That would be amazing!
What he saidâŠ
I am still thinking there is SOME retroactive changes in that it asks a NEW set of agencies to opine on the appropriateness of our investment because I only have pre-approval, and there is still an approval stepâŠ
Difficult to say if the government really âyieldedâ anything or this was their plan all along and the PM was just being vague about it for ⊠reasons.
âInvestor visas still available for cultural investmentsâ
If true, I wonder why they bothered if the D2 is replacing ARI?
we need to clarify whether the key is upon renewal, whether the GV will become a normal D2 and need to fulfill all the D2 requirements (except minimum stay period). Not sure if it is a worse deal than the original golden visa.
For example, GV can be renewed as long as the investment is maintained, but what will happen if the special D2 visa expired? Can it be renewed under the special terms? Does requirement for D2 visa such proof of setting up companies, financial resources, etc need to be fulfilled? (seems so under this legal text)
+1 for Madalena. I also know her!