According to a report by the Canadian World Journal, China has become the largest source country for investment immigrants to Canada. Despite the investment threshold being raised from $400,000 to $800,000 last year, the surge in applications has not abated. Immigration lawyer Richard Kurland believes the investment threshold should be raised to $1.2 million, noting that the Hong Kong consulate alone has a backlog of 15,835 cases with a potential investment value of $6.3 billion, which will take at least four years to process, meaning there is no need to worry about a lack of applicants.
China has been the largest source country for investment immigrants to Canada for many consecutive years. Although the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration raised the investment threshold from the original $400,000 to $800,000 on December 1 last year, and increased the personal net worth requirement from $800,000 to $1.6 million, it has not stopped the surge in Chinese investment immigration applications. This year, the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration further announced that it would only accept 700 new investment immigration applications annually, a quota that was filled in just a few days.
The Hong Kong consulate primarily handles applicants from southern Chinese provinces. The consulate's immigration program manager stated that the future processing principle will be "two old, one new," meaning for every two old cases processed, one new case will be handled until all backlogged cases are cleared.
Immigration lawyer Richard Kurland believes that the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration should raise the investment threshold again to $1.2 million and increase the personal net worth requirement to $2.5 million. He stated that this change poses no risk to Canada's investment immigration policy because even without any new applications, the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration would not be able to finish processing the backlog at the Hong Kong consulate until 2015, and a situation where no one applies is simply impossible.
Previously, following the increase in application thresholds, the federal government issued and implemented a new policy limiting applications to 700 per year, a move that directly led to a surge in Quebec applications. Worldway experts believe that in order to alleviate the pressure on immigration officers, Canada is likely to "increase prices" again after having raised the application threshold and introduced quota policies. We advise prospective investment immigration clients to seize the time to submit their applications to avoid having your immigration costs "involuntarily increased."
