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Episode 1: The NEW Investment Migration Market and The Rise of Western Investor Migrants · IMI Podcasts

• 0:12
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome to the first episode of the best of my questions are new podcasts.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_02: We also ask that I don't get to start the voice of the best of my questions.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_02: I'd like to remind you that you can follow all of our life stories on our website, iMIDail.com, and on our mobile podcast or free newsletters as well as on your favorite social media network.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_02: You can also follow this podcast on Spotify, at the podcast, and most other podcast platforms.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: With the preambles out of the way, let's get this show on the road.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_03: Our topic today is the new investment migration market and the rise of Western investor migrants.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_03: And we have a series of questions related to that, which we'll explore during the course of this talk.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_03: But since this is the first ever episode of the mobility standard, I figured we'd take a few minutes to explain who we are, what this podcast is about, and why we're starting it.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_03: So, first off, as the name implies, the mobility standard is going to discuss questions, current events, and stories relating to global mobility, specifically in the context of investment migration.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_03: I want to give the audience a chance to get to know the people who are on the podcast.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, so why don't you go ahead and introduce yourselves very briefly, say who you are, and we'll start with Roelio.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thanks for having me.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm really looking forward to this mobility standard.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's going to be a great experience for us to share and invite uh distinguished guests from all over the world to talk about this fascinating trend and industry.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a first generation U.S.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: immigrant.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: My parents met here in the United States from Latin America, El Salvador, and the Dominican Republic.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I live here in Miami as the founder and CEO of a first and only US-based investment advisory firm that provides a platform of mobility assets, the residency or golden visas or passports, both for American investors looking for an insurance policy or international investors looking for uh green cars through the EV5 program.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'm thrilled to be here and looking forward to lots of chats uh along the way.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: So thanks for having me.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_03: Fantastic.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_03: Ahmad, tell us a little bit about who you are, how you came to be on this podcast.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Hey Christian, well, I'm actually here as part of IMI now.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm the director of content services, which is uh amazing working with uh a lot of RCBI firms around the globe.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_03: And um that's sorry, sorry, sorry, before you go on, Ahmad, I just want to say I'm really, really happy to have you on board.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_03: Ahmad is the first full-time employee at uh Investment Migration Insider after my wife.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_03: It's been a family business up until now.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_03: Now Ahmad's come on board, and uh I guess he'll get the family treatment as well, of course, uh within reason.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_03: But super duper happy to have him on board.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_03: Uh tell us a little bit about what you did before you were you came to IMI full-time.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I actually started in the investment migration industry with Ritchie Migration.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: They are a consultancy firm in the MENA region, uh focused on the Middle East.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I started in research and uh development, so uh it was a great introduction to the industry.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: We we started researching investment migration programs, uh knowing the ins and outs, and it gave me a unique view before moving on to business uh development.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: And um, you know that research uh background stays with me, and uh to be able to discuss this, it's more a hobby than it is work now.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_03: All right, cool.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_03: So I guess that concludes the introductions.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_03: So every few years, a black swan event arrives to, in one way or another, drastically change the trajectory of the investment migration market.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_03: It happened in the years following the global financial crisis a decade ago.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_03: Dozens of new residents and citizenship by investment programs launched globally, often as a response to government debt crises.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_03: In 2011, 2012, we had the Arab Spring, which saw a massive rise in demand from the Middle East in 2019.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_03: The same happened in Hong Kong.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_03: Uh finally, now, last year, 2020, the pandemic turned the whole world on its head, not just our industry, of course, um, but all industries.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_03: And one of the most remarkable outcomes of that extraordinary year was that it put investment migration and the need for global mobility assets, as Roelio is fond of calling it, on the radar of people from countries that until then had very extensive travel and settlement freedoms and had therefore never given much thought to the need to diversify their passport or residency portfolios.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_03: Last year, Americans were the third largest applicant group from both Portugal's Golden Visa Program, New Zealand's investor visa program, and I think they're among the top 10 in source countries for programs like Antigua and Barbuda CIP, Australia's business.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_03: What's what is it offline?
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_03: BIP, what does it stand for again?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_03: Business investment program, the UK's Tier 1 program, they're in the top 10 there, they're in the top 10 in the Thai elite visa, even the South Korean investor visa, probably a lot of Korean Americans, if I had to venture a guess, they're also in the top 10 in St.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_03: Lucia, the St.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_03: Lucia CIP.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_03: But if we go back just a few years, Americans were hardly in the top 10 anywhere.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_03: And so this for me is extremely exciting because if the West truly wakes up to the need for global mobility assets, it'll catapult the in that migration market to new heights for the simple reason that about three in four high net worth individuals, high net worth individuals, by the way, is is a fancy um initialization that normal people just call millionaires.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_03: So I'll just call it millionaires going forward.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_03: Uh it's a pretty uh it's a pretty tricky initial initialization to use H N W I.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_03: So just rich people, millionaires, people have investable assets of more than a million.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_03: Three out of four millionaires worldwide don't live in emerging markets, they live in what we think of as the developed world.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_03: Whether that's uh a moniker that's uh deserved or not, but North America, Western Europe, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, essentially, you know the countries I'm talking about, OECD countries, right?
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_03: Three out of four millionaires worldwide live there.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_03: And until now, uh this industry has barely been targeting them at all because we presumed that look, uh there's no they don't have any need for it.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_03: But then 2020 happens and Americans discover wow, I can't travel anywhere anymore.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_03: I I used to think I had this great passport.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_03: What happened, right?
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_03: So, my big question for this is okay, and I'll bring this to you, uh Rogelio, since you're you're living in the United States and you're feeling this.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, is this rise of the Western investor migrant a temporary splash in the pan?
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_03: Or are we seeing the contours of a mega trend?
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_03: What do you think?
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think and I hope that it's a mega trend.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's gonna depend a lot on uh the success that companies like Global RCG and many others have in commercializing and creating the awareness that's really needed for any one country to adopt uh this type of asset class.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: This comes from our experience in EB5, where countries like Brazil and India, South Africa for decades had very little awareness of EB5.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_01: If you know Indians, as well, I'm sure you do, they're everywhere, right?
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: They're a phenomenal uh entrepreneurial type of uh population.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: When we landed there, landed like with uh Christopher Columbus, we arrived in Bombay uh in December of 2015.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: Blank stares looked at us when we said, Hey, EB5, you can get a green card by investing, followed by skepticism, followed by what what sorry, what year what year was this right here?
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_01: This is December 2015.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, so not that long ago.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_01: Not that long ago.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the EB5 program was launched in 1990.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, if there's one community that knows the value of a green card, uh, provably is the Indian community here in the United States.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: They're the most successful uh ethnic uh minority uh or nationality of any by far.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: So they know what the value of a green card is, and whoever we talked to in India did not know it was the awareness was low.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: Proof of that is that the year before we got there, 96 visas total were in the country.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a point why I'm raising this.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so a country like India with 1.3 billion people, with an affinity and an ability and the uh uh monetary uh wherewithal to invest had no idea that it existed.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: And the reason is because that no one had bothered to set up operations, talk about the program, and spend the hours and months and weeks and years it takes really to create that confidence that this is something real.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_01: That's not too good to be true, that you can't put a half a million bucks in an American company, a business, a real estate project, and get a green card in a year.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: That just sounded too good to be true.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm not saying that the US market is exactly the same, but awareness level wise, I think there's a big uh there's a lot of similarities.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so we decided, right, as the first company to enter the space with books on the ground, an office here in uh in Miami, one in California, and others to come, that the only way you can really grow a market is by meeting people, uh, by being local, by uh providing the type of confidence that you're here for the long haul and spending the time and effort necessary to educate the market.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: So if that happens, and it can't just be uh you know one company, uh I frankly came into the industry because of something you in part, I wouldn't say it's entirely, your uh your benefit, Christian, but it is not uh uh escape net that that call to action you had on a Mona Shop podcast last year uh to the whole EB5 industry was was really compelling.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_03: And so uh Well why just just just so the listeners understand what you're talking about, what what was my call to what was the essence of what I said on that podcast?
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's on the first page of my business plan.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_01: I can't quote it directly, but basically you said EB5 industry, come, come, come to the residency and citizenship by investment uh industry.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: You guys are so sophisticated, you know, you've done so well in one program, know how that sophistication can be leveraged in multiple areas.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, come and visit the Caribbean and visit us uh in Europe, etc.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, something like that.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: One main point is no investment migration market with zero or very little awareness grows organically without the investment of time and energy of industry professionals to condition the market.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_01: That's kind of the main headline there.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_01: But it also uh that's not the only, it's a it's a necessary condition, but not sufficient.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh decorated professor.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: What you also need are are drivers, right?
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and drivers include uh a perfect storm that occurred uh in the United States last year, anywhere from uh the unrest, the social unrest that is more typical of other countries around the world, uh January 6th of this year is if that's not a poster child for what could potentially nobody thought would ever happen, happened, uh, and other examples are included.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: So that combined with the pandemic and the insecurity that that promoted, the lack of sufficient response from the government, in my opinion, on the healthcare front, uh, combined with a new administration with a more progressive view on taxation and regulatory environment, combined with the passport, as you mentioned, dropping what over nearly a hundred countries less from a visa-free travel perspective.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: So you have a perfect storm of mobility challenges, regulatory tax issues, uh the quality of life, the right track, wrong track at an all-time low.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and there's a community there that's looking for answers, safety, security, uh, a backup plan, an insurance policy.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so they uh should benefit uh Americans, just like Russians and Indians and Chinese and folks from the Middle East have benefited for decades.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: Time has come for Americans and uh Western Europeans and Latin Americans in general to also benefit from this uh great asset class that does provide so many benefits to not just the home countries, but to the individuals that decide to acquire.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: So I think the time is perfect for not for all of us to really roll up our sleeves and create that awareness.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: And this podcast is uh a very great step in all the things that you guys do at IMI Delhi as well.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_03: So some of these push factors that you're you're talking about that uh have arisen recently, I mean, some of them are long-standing push factors.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_03: For example, FATCA is one of those push factors, um, global taxation, citizenship taxation, like the United States does.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_03: Those have existed for some time and they've kind of uh been there in the background and and have been gradually building up interest in alternative global mobility assets among Americans, but then the new push factor is the pandemic.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_03: And I think what I want to get at, and I want to bring this to the ACMA because I'm wondering say we fast forward three, four, five years from now, the pandemic is you know long in the rear view mirror.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_03: Um, will that that new awareness that Americans have had in this last year will that stick?
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: I think what Varolia said is absolutely right.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: Awareness is gonna be the biggest problem, and we just can't sit and wait for the market to become aware by itself.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: But I don't think it just hinges on awareness on the long term.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, okay, you have these mature markets like uh Dubai, Russia, Hong Kong, China, but the Caribbean nations, I'm gonna talk basically Caribbean, not uh about the EU.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: They optimize their programs to meet the needs of these people.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's gonna be not just about the demand is there.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: Will the Caribbean nations do something special, do something dedicated for the Western or the more uh developed country nationals to entice them to come in?
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: It could be investment amounts, could be different uh program, uh let's say uh pipelines or uh even a different type of uh incentive coming in for them.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: That really depends on how they think.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, okay.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_04: So on that point, obviously that's that's I I never thought of that.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_04: The fact that uh for example, if we if we continue with the example of the Caribbean programs, they've sort of co-evolved with the the dance side.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_03: So in the sense that as as you know, they saw that demand was coming from the Middle East, Russia CIS, East Asia, Southeast Asia, and and they've tailored their program to some extent to cater to that demand.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_03: And so they've this is why I say co-evolved, just like you know, humans and snakes have co-evolved, like uh snakes have evolved to to disguise themselves from humans, and humans have uh evolved better eyesight to see snakes and avoid them, right?
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_03: Uh and and in the Caribbean, yeah, they they, for example, uh a lot of the recent changes have had to do with making applications more economical for large families.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_03: And that's explicitly a move to cater to uh predominantly Sunni Muslim countries in the Middle East where it's very common to have big families, right?
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_03: And so yeah, the qu the question now is well, what can we do to restructure these programs or to uh change our marketing or to change our packages or pricing to target Americans directly?
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_03: That's an excellent point.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_03: I never thought of that.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_03: Go ahead, continue on.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_03: I don't want to interrupt.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, no, it's fine.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I would love to get a US point of view on this.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: Well, uh we did we have a point of view.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_01: I I think for the the health of the industry, it is somewhat risky for any investor to give their money to a foreign in uh company in a foreign jurisdiction and have no real control over how that money is spent, when it's spent, etc.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: I think the ideal solution are proprietary, co-managed funds, if you will, where uh US companies, European companies, where the source of the capital is more involved in how it's distributed, uh, make sure that the construction occurs on time, that the money isn't siphoned away by partnering, not by coming in as gringos, right?
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_01: Americans and and buying real estate and running the whole show, but identifying local partners in in Greece or Spain or Ireland or Australia that might be interested in US capital and a flow of capital from there and provide more institutional controls and more oversight so that that investor feels more confident that it's not just a straight up buying a passport, which is you know perfectly fine.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: That's an it's an acquisition, it's like any other asset.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there's nothing wrong with that at all.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: But if we really want to grow this and appeal to more people that just can't can't really afford just to spend uh 500,000 euros on a passport, but want a return on that capital, then you create uh vehicles that allow the investor to earn a fair return based on that risk that they're taking.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_01: And that involves a little bit more of financial engineering, more investment uh know-how.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: And that's one thing that we're looking to forward to innovating uh in this.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_03: So what you're describing there, uh to me, it sounds like you're saying we need more vertical integration.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_03: Essentially, you're saying we need to capture, or or if if one like let's say a US firm or a Western firm can kind of control the whole value chain from A to Z.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_03: So that you invest with them initially, but they don't simply pass you along to some fund in Portugal.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_03: They themselves own the fund and control the fund in Portugal, and they themselves uh vet the properties that they invest in, and so that the person that you you know you're walking into an office in Miami or in LA or wherever, and you're handing over all this capital that's gonna go into some fund in some foreign jurisdiction that you may never have even visited, uh, you're gonna feel more comfortable if you're talking, you know, getting the information directly from the horse's mouth, so to speak, right?
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_03: That's is that what you're mean?
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, uh I wouldn't use the term vertical integration because that would mean that the American company also is responsible for building the you know hotel in in the Al Garbs or in the U.S.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, so you don't okay, so you you would you're saying you would draw the line at some point that so not the whole value change.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: Not the whole value change, because there's no way it's a recipe for disaster for foreigners of any ilk to come into any other country and be responsible for building something on time.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_01: And construction is difficult uh in and of itself, and it's all about local connections and knowing the local labor movement, et cetera.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_01: So you want strong local partners.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: What I'm referring to is a co shared.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Interest where it's not just here's the money, tell us how it goes, right?
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: Hope for the best, but that the a fund or a special purpose vehicles are created where uh the American firm or the Western firm uh has an ownership stake, and therefore their investors that they represent has an ownership stake and some control over how the money is spent rather than just here's a check for 500,000.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, so you're saying so you're saying that uh the consultancy firm needs to have skin in the game, basically.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: Everybody needs skin in the game and co-invest with your investors, identify strong local partners in each of these countries, and um show that they're already there, right?
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: All these countries have great local funds and local developers.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: What they hope are open to is if we can deliver$30 million worth of American capital that's been vetted and of great individuals that want XYZ countries program, would you be open to creating a vehicle that allows them to earn a better return than what they're earning now or or have more visibility rights in terms of how it gets constructed so that there's more confidence?
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: Ultimately it's about trust and confidence, and that builds confidence when there's more eyeballs looking at the flow of money.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_01: That will allow this asset class really to grow and do something that perhaps others might not think of, and that's why label it.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_01: Why not go to Morgan Stanley or Northern Trust or or other funds and say, hey, we you want to uh introduce this asset for Australia?
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: Let's partner with Moelis Australia, who's a tremendous developer, uh sorry, uh fund manager there, and co-brand it with a local company.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: It can be in Europe, it can be anywhere in the world.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_01: And now you have you know power and numbers to to have everyone do a little bit better than just blind faith, hope for the best.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, that's what's yeah, go on.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's that's actually uh interesting for someone like me who's working in a differently uh in an entirely different market, because what you're talking about, Raelio, it wouldn't really matter in the Middle East and let's say maybe China as well, because the risk here doesn't outweigh the need.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: The need outweighs the risk.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: So investors won't care, most probably, of course, won't care if the development gets built in 10, 20, 30 years.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: They don't really there's a money guarantee to that that you can sell the share to the next guy who comes to buy citizenship, that's it.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's a means to an end.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: They don't really care about anything in between.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_04: So that's I think that's the gap that um, so they don't they don't care, they they don't care if they lose their whole principle so long as they get that passport.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_04: Is that what you're doing?
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, even if you look at statistics from the Middle East, a lot will go for, depending on the family uh composition, the contribution amount depends mostly on how much they're gonna pay.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: If the real estate is less, they'll go for real estate.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: Contribution is less, they're going for contribution.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: They don't really look at the investment, they don't really look at they need the passport and they need it quickly.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: And now a word from our sponsors.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: Hi, my name is Rogelio Castellis, and I'm the CEO and founder of the Global Residency and Citizenship Group, headquartered here in Miami, Florida.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: We're the only U.S.-based investment firm that provides a globally diversified platform of mobility assets acquired through venture capital, real estate, and private equity investments here in the United States, as well as at over 20 destinations around the world, including Canada, the Caribbean, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know if you remember this, Ahmad, but a few years ago, uh, and this is back to uh what uh Rohelio was saying about you know uh the the consultancy having skin in the game uh or share some of the some of the risk with the client.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_03: Harvey Law Group took a 20% stake in in the uh what is it, the sixth census, the range developments uh project in in Grenada.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_03: Is that correct?
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_03: Uh Ahmad?
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_03: You remember?
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: From what I remember, yeah, I I I knew they wanted to do it.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if they go uh went through with it or not.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_03: No, I believe they did it.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_03: I believe they announced that they went through it.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_03: But I'm just citing that as an example.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, here you have a client-facing law firm specializing in investment migration, and they're taking a stake in the very project that they are uh recommending to their clients, right?
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_03: Is this what uh this is kind of what you're talking about, Rohelio, right?
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: That in in in a way, yes, in the sense that they they bought at a discount and I believed, and were able to uh believe so much in the project that they uh bought in bulk uh and and transfer that over.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: That's an excellent indication of uh faith in Mohammed Asari and all the great work that he's done.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh what I'm referring to is more what what EB5 is like.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: So back to your call of action last year.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: What EB5 does is in most cases, a regional center will create a vehicle uh that they they manage with their investors in a GPLP structure, right?
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_01: A fund, if you will, that could be a fund for a single project.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't have to be a fund for multiple projects, but because of that structure, there's more oversight over the project, there's more uh information flow, there's more uh you know rights that you have to besides just here's a check to build uh the conduct.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: I get your point, I think it's an excellent one.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_01: Need versus bells and whistles or control.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: If you need a passport, you're gonna be less uh less sticky about whether this or that.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but to attract the Western market, right?
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: The question was around how and can the local countries uh shift their uh conditions or requirements or create the conditions or requirements that attract more capital.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh any industry you attract more capital if it's not just for the folks who can afford to spend it and write it off.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: And there's ways to do that without gringos coming in, again, an affectionate term for Americans, landing in uh in Lisbon and starting to try to do it all themselves.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: That that's not going to work.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_01: That's a recipe for us getting fleeced in these countries.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_01: We we're not uh in favor of that.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: Identifying a local partner that's doing things the right way already, wants some Western capital, and is willing to uh be more transparent about how it's used, that's uh I think uh a value proposition that wins.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's different than what uh our good friend Jean Francois did.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's a step in the right direction, but ultimately it's about uh a legal structure where investors come in and and have a say in the project.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_01: That's just one way.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's not the only way, but that's certainly one way for uh folks to attract more uh opportunities.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_03: Alrighty.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_03: I want to talk more.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_03: You mentioned before, you know, how the the programs and the market is very much, you know, it's I said it's co-evolved with uh demand from the Middle East, yeah, Russia, CIS, East Asia, Southeast Asia to some extent.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_03: Put yourself in the chair of a CIU CIU chairman somewhere in the Caribbean.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_03: And your job, you're you're tasked with attracting more American and European applicants.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_03: What is it you have to do?
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_03: How do you have to restructure your program to get those guys interested?
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean, first of all, branding would be branding would be essential without restructuring.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: So because uh we've just gone back and forth talking about visa visel, and that's what most global mobility firms go about on the Caribbean.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: But if you look at Turkey, which grants you access to 111 uh countries, but as Rahali said, none of them um make any uh let's say big splash.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_00: I mean it's Brazil and uh most of South America, most of Africa.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: A passport is much more than just travel.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: So the Caribbean states themselves have to make it for the Western investor.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: Not like the person coming in from Russia, China, the Middle East who may never ever see Dominica in their lives.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: They have to rebrand, restructure, use the money coming in to, yeah, we're not just a place that sells you a passport, we're a place where you can come and stay, we're a place where you can put your money, your business.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: I think the program itself will have to have more evolved investment types like what we're seeing in Europe.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_00: Things that what do you mean by that?
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_03: What do you mean by that?
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_04: More involved investments.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: Well, let's look at Ireland, for example.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_00: Ireland, the IIP, has uh the IAP doesn't tell you you have to uh invest in uh this uh project or you don't have to invest in.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_00: I mean it's open ground, you can pick and choose.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_00: Same thing with the UK tier one investor.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: But the government of Ireland does have a couple of preferred projects, uh social housing, nursing homes, and so on.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: If the Caribbean nations would create funds made not just to uh let's say uh battle the effects of a hurricane or uh COVID or so on, create something to make the island's infrastructure more livable, the island's uh offerings for people who would come thinking, yeah, I can uh yeah, I can stay here, I can live here.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_02: And that is it for today, folks.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_02: But we'll be back soon with another episode of the mobility standard.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_02: In the meantime, I encourage you to let earlier standard the questions you have about the questions.