Recently, the U.S. Department of State has announced that all the EB-5 investment immigrant visas for the fiscal year 2014 allocated to Chinese investors have been exhausted. As of now, the review of investment immigration visa applications from Chinese investors will be suspended until the new fiscal year begins on October 1, 2014, at which point the processing of Chinese EB-5 applications will resume. This marks the first time since the enactment of this law in 1990 that the quotas for Chinese applicants have been depleted before the end of the fiscal year.
In the fiscal year 2014, approximately 10,650 investment immigrant visas were issued by the United States, of which about 8,000 were allocated to Chinese immigrants. This is the first occurrence of Chinese quotas being exhausted before the end of the allocation period in the 24 years since the EB-5 program commenced. This news suggests that there will likely be a longer waiting period for Chinese investment immigrants in 2015, which is almost inevitable.
The newly appointed Director of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Leon Rodriguez, indicated during a conference call with immigration stakeholders in mid-August that the applications for the I-526 and I-829 forms surged by 700% and 500%, respectively, between 2007 and 2013, with the majority of these applications coming from Chinese nationals.
