On August 2020 the Government Gazette officially published the final changes of the “Cyprus Investment Program”.
• The parents of the applicant, as well as the parents of the applicant’s spouse are eligible to apply for the acquisition of the Cypriot Citizenship with a supplementary investment of €500.000 plus VAT (if applicable), individually or collectively 1-million-euro.
• Dependent adult family members (18 to 28 years old) can now apply for the acquisition of the Cypriot Citizenship through naturalization by exception, simultaneously with the main investor. This is a major change since it reduces dramatically the application waiting time.
• Financial dependent adult children between the ages of 18 – 28 years old, which are married, are no longer qualified to apply under their parents’ application. If they wish to be eligible to apply for the acquisition of the Cypriot citizenship, then they must process a separate application and fulfill all the requirements of the program as stated by the Civil Registry Laws of the Cyprus Investment Programme.
• Applicants are no longer eligible to apply for the acquisition of the Cypriot Citizenship through the incorporation of a development company and/or investment in own development project.
• If an applicant chooses to invest in a Cypriot company, then it must employ at least nine (9) Cypriot or EU citizens in order to be eligible to apply.
• The donation amounts to the Research and Innovation Foundation, as well as to the Cyprus Land Development Corporation, changed from €75.000 euro to €100.000 euro each. Donation is now settled to €200.000 in total.
• According to the regulation provisions of the program, all funds related with the fulfillment of the investment criteria of the Cyprus Investment Programme, including the purchase of the permanent private residence of the applicant and Republic payments for the investments, should be wired from the applicant’s overseas bank account or the applicant’s company / companies to a licensed Cyprus Financial institution that is controlled by the Central Bank of Cyprus. It is noted that all wired transfer copies should be attached to investor’s application upon submission.
• The police clearance certificate must be no more than six (6) months old.
• Political Exposed Persons (PEPs) should not have held public office up to a year before the time of their application, in order to be eligible to apply. It should be stressed that this change from five (5) to one (1) year applies only when PEPs did not occupy important political positions i.e. ministers or their deputies, ambassadors, heads of states or governments, cities mayors etc.
• Applicants that were convicted with a serious criminal offence with a sentence over five (5) years, or any other offence of similar severity, are not eligible to apply for the acquisition of the Cypriot citizenship through the Cyprus Investment Programme. This restriction applies also if an applicant is convicted for a specific crime in another country, that crime is considered to be a crime held in the Republic of Cyprus, with a resembling imprisonment sentence.
• Additionally, applicants that are under criminal investigation with a possible sentence of minimum five (5) years are not qualified to submit an application for the acquisition of the Cypriot Citizenship through naturalization by exception.
