 |
 |
 |
Report: UK’s immigrant investor program not as successful as EB-5
While America's EB-5 visa program has experienced tremendous growth in recent years, Britain's version of the investor visa program has floundered.
The UK entrepreneur visa program was launched by then Prime Minister Gordon Brown, and has not achieved the success that some would have liked, according to the Daily Telegraph.
A spokeswoman for the UK's Home Office said the current system had "failed to attract the numbers we wanted."
"The strict and cumbersome requirements of the existing policy mean that only a few hundred people use it each year," she told the news provider.
According to the news source, only 120 people from outside of the European Union received immigration visas to the UK through the program.
The U.S.'s EB-5 visa program, on the other hand, issued 4,218 to immigrant investors in fiscal 2009.
The EB-5 visa program allows foreign nationals to become U.S. green card eligible. If a foreigner invests $1 million (or in some areas, $500,000) in an American business and that investment leads to the creation or preservation of 10 jobs, the investor and his family become eligible for U.S. green cards.