The government of Portugal announced that it is tightening its control over the issuance of residential permits to ensure that foreign investors continue to restore confidence in its ‘Golden Visa’ programme, which offers investors the chance to live in Portugal when they invest at least €500,000 in property there.
Although the scheme has resulted in investments of more than €1bn in investments, mostly from Chinese property buyers, it has been rocked in the past few months my allegations and arrests for corruption, influence peddling and money laundering.
Some Chinese investors felt short-changed by the scheme when they found out that ‘middle men’ had overcharged them by about a quarter of the value of the transactions.
