Immigration Lawyer Says $ 2 Billion In Investor Visas Stuck In Red Tape

Only a handful of immigration officials are working on processing investor visas that have a total value of more than $ 2 billion.

An immigration attorney says the potential investment “locked in an office in Wellington” should be released.

In a briefing for incoming Immigration Minister Kris Faafoi, immigration officials said that immigrant business investors had invested $ 1.36 billion in the first six months of this year.

But Immigration New Zealand (INZ) said it cannot legally grant new visas to people with little chance of obtaining border clearance at this time.

The figures show that since the end of April, the number of “available” investor applications increased 44 percent, from 288 to 414.

But since July only 11 visa applications have been decided for category 1 investors, with a minimum investment price of $ 10 million each, and 17 in category 2, which has a minimum of $ 3 million but more stringent criteria.

Call for more resources

Immigration attorney Simon Laurent said more resources needed to be focused on INZ’s Migrant Investor Team to work on the lucrative visas.

“Just by doing a rough estimate based solely on Investor Category 1, we are talking about $ 2 billion, based on each investor when applicants would be looking to invest $ 10 million.

“And even if we assume that only half of the roughly 400 applications available at this time are approved, it is probably still about 200 applications at $ 10 million each that are in the queue.

“Certainly there is much more interest in North America, the United States in particular, than a couple of years ago. It used to be that Chinese applicants made up the bulk of the cohort.

“Also, and this applies to those in the US in particular, they include a growing number of capable entrepreneurs whose interest is in startups and new technologies. New Zealand’s small, nimble market has for some time been the dyno to lead-edge developments.

“There can be a real pull in funding and supporting local businesses that are taking on leadership roles in areas like biotech.”

Laurent said statistics indicated that the processing of investor visa applications was very slow.

Verifying the source of funds could sometimes go back several decades and was too onerous, he added.

“I think we may be losing people due to this obsession with ensuring that the money has been legally earned, especially by people who have a reasonably high profile and can demonstrate that they are in legitimate business operations. And that information for many of them would be available. in the public domain “.

He and another attorney RNZ spoke to were told that only two immigration officers are working on investor visas.

Border closure impact process – INZ

In a statement, INZ said it has seven commercial immigration specialists who evaluate visas alongside other applications, such as global impact and retirement visas.

“While the borders are closed, INZ cannot legally grant visas to people who are unlikely to meet the entry requirements due to current border restrictions,” said a spokesperson.

“This has had an impact on the processing of visa applications from individuals abroad, including the processing of investor category visa applications from individuals outside of New Zealand. However, INZ has continued to process visa applications from individuals who they are already in New Zealand. “

Chinese investor applicants fell from 71 to 41 in the last six months compared to the same period last year, while the number from the US increased from six to 38, continuing a trend that began with the lockdown of Covid-19.