The Corporate Citizenship by investment (CCBI) is a new concept for business investors, only became popular after late 2010.
The whole idea is applying investment model to acquire a citizenship through corporate investment. The investment must create jobs, sustainable development and economic growth in the country.
Corporate citizenship is not citizenship by investment (CBI). The difference lies in corporate citizenship model must be a large scale business investment, leading to job creation, economic growth, sustainable development and most importantly achieve high standards of living for people. Current CBI schemes involve only donation model, or investment in government bonds that does not lead to job creation. Job creation is the key for the success of the model.
Corporate investors investing in new hotels, resorts or other enterprise projects in sustainable development, are eligible for citizenship by investment schemes. All corporate investors who own shares of certain threshold also qualify for citizenship including their family members
The concept of Corporate citizenship is super interesting from investment point of view especially for governments interested in sustainable development, FDI and job creation.
What is Corporate citizenship?
In real world definition of the Corporate citizenship refers to a company’s responsibilities toward society. The goal is companies to produce higher standards of living and quality of life for the communities that surround them and still maintain profitability for stakeholders according to Investopedia.
The same goal applies for corporate citizenship through investment schemes.
The corporate investment projects in these countries produce economic development in these countries, creating more jobs, support growth of tourism, more taxes and VAT collections bringing more benefits to society while still generating profits, while still meeting legal, ethical and economic corporate responsibilities. Job creation, economic growth is the key.
The Corporate investments can be made in any sustainable development projects in these countries such as green energy, education, transport, tourism, information technology, research etc.
The corporate citizenship schemes currently only run in 6 countries requiring a high value investment
- Antigua and Barbuda ($5 million minimum provided $400,000 per company share)
- Montenegro (€5 to 10 million in five star hotels, agriculture, sustainable development energy)
- Cyprus (no ceilings but contribution €2 million per share)
- St Lucia ($3 million with each share of $350,000 )
- Moldova (no limits but €250,000 per investor share)
- Bulgaria (EUR 1 million, citizenship after 1 year)
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We anticipate the rise of corporate citizenships will create a new billion dollar industry in the future, contributing to millions of dollars in FDI business investments expanding to several dozen countries.
