Investor Routes in the Americas and Oceania: A Map

How to read this map

In the year to August 2026 the developed economies of the Americas and Oceania walked out of the residence trade almost in unison. Australia closed the Business Innovation and Investment Program to new applications on 31 July 2024 and left a single channel open — the National Innovation Visa (subclass 858), where money is not a criterion at all. Canada zeroed out intake under the Start-Up Visa from 1 January 2026 and has held the Self-Employed Persons Program in abeyance since April 2024, promising a "more targeted" entrepreneur pilot with no published parameters. The United States raised the bar and added a paid route — the Gold Card — whose legal fate is being decided in court and whose approval count was still in the single digits by spring 2026. Only New Zealand kept a working capital programme: the Active Investor Plus visa, relaunched in April 2025, is a rare case of an investor route in an OECD country that is open and actually issuing status.

Cheap entry has not disappeared — it has moved to Latin America, and the logic there is different. Panama, Paraguay, Brazil, Chile and Uruguay grant status quickly and for sums that would not cover legal fees in North America. But that entry carries a built-in asymmetry: migration status arrives easily, while the tax effect has to be calculated separately, because territoriality here does not equal zero. Panama and Paraguay genuinely do not tax foreign income, but neither of them confers tax residence automatically. Uruguay, under Ley 20.446, raised the investment threshold for entry into tax residence roughly fourfold from 1 January 2026 and taxes foreign capital income at 12% for those outside the holiday. Brazil and Chile are full worldwide-income jurisdictions, where investor residence means a tax burden rather than the absence of one.

The headline conclusion for the region: an investor route here no longer buys either a fast passport or a tax exemption — it buys either a specific status in a specific country (New Zealand, Panama, Paraguay) or market access (Brazil, Chile, the E-2 in the United States). The map has to be read along three axes at once: what is being bought and under which rule of law, what happens with presence and renewal, and what the status does to tax residence. The table row gives the cross-section; the profile below answers five questions — what is bought and under which rule, timelines and procedure, presence and renewal, tax effect, reform status. If the region itself is not settled, start a level up, with the investor cluster map, which sets out which entry model answers which objective.

Comparison along common axes

Data as at 14 August 2026. Thresholds change by secondary legislation without amending the statute — verify them on your filing date.

Jurisdiction profiles

United States: EB-5 after the reform

What is bought. EB-5 is the only American route where money converts directly into a green card, and since the EB-5 Reform and Integrity Act of 2022 its parameters are fixed by statute: $800,000 for a project in a rural area, a targeted employment area of high unemployment or an infrastructure project, $1,050,000 otherwise, plus the requirement to create or preserve ten full-time jobs. The RIA introduced visa set-asides: 20% of the annual quota for rural projects, roughly 10% for high-unemployment areas and around 2% for infrastructure. It is the set-aside, not the sum, that determines how attractive a given project is.

Timelines and procedure. By spring 2026 an I-526E petition on a rural project was taking around eight months on average, against roughly eleven for high-unemployment areas; from 30 March 2026 USCIS moved rural petitions to first-in, first-out processing. Through the first half of 2026 the reserved categories in the visa bulletin remained current, whereas the unreserved category for India and China has long been backlogged; retrogression in the rural category is treated as a matter of time, with waiting estimates running to four years.

Presence and renewal. The conditional green card is issued for two years; conditions are removed on Form I-829 once the investment and the jobs are confirmed. The obligations are the standard ones for a U.S. permanent resident.

Tax effect. The harshest on this map: a green card makes the holder a U.S. person subject to worldwide income taxation and full foreign-asset reporting, and leaving the status above certain thresholds triggers the exit tax. Planning is done before the status is acquired.

Reform status. There are two dates in the calendar, and confusing them is expensive. RIA grandfathering closes on 30 September 2026: petitions filed by that date are protected from later rule changes and threshold increases and continue to be adjudicated even if the programme lapses. Authorisation of the regional centre programme expires on 30 September 2027; anything filed after September 2026 has no such protection. Route detail: EB-5: the green card by investment.

United States: the E-2 and the Gold Card

What is bought. The E-2 is the non-immigrant treaty investor visa: it has no statutory minimum but requires a "substantial" investment in a real, operating business, proportionate to that business's value, and citizenship of a country with which the United States has a treaty of commerce and navigation. Neither Russia nor China is on that list, which is why for Russian-speaking capital the E-2 is usually built on a second citizenship — most often Turkish or Grenadian. The Gold Card is a different construction: a payment of $1m from an individual or $2m under a corporate sponsorship scheme plus a $15,000 fee, with the status itself processed through the existing EB-1 and EB-2 immigrant categories.

Timelines and procedure. The E-2 is filed at a consulate and, with a complete file, takes weeks to months; the visa renews indefinitely for as long as the business operates. The Gold Card was launched by an executive order of September 2025, intake opened in December, and by the end of April 2026 one approval had been confirmed against what the administration described as hundreds of applications in the queue.

Presence and renewal. The E-2 requires the business to be actively directed; a dormant company is a standard ground for refusal on renewal. The Gold Card, processed as an immigrant category, carries the ordinary obligations of a permanent resident.

Tax effect. The E-2 by itself does not create U.S. person status — the substantial presence test governs instead, which is precisely why the E-2 is sometimes chosen as a way of living in the United States without entering the worldwide-income regime immediately. The Gold Card, by contrast, leads into the same tax perimeter as EB-5.

Reform status. The Gold Card is being challenged in the federal district court for the District of Columbia: the suit was filed on 3 February 2026, arguing that the programme circumvents the requirements Congress set for the EB-1 and EB-2 categories. Until the court rules, this is a product with unresolved legal risk, not an alternative to EB-5. Those going the achievement route should look at EB-1A.

Canada: a federal pause and the Quebec route

What is bought. From 2026, at the federal level, almost nothing. The Start-Up Visa, the only mass entrepreneurial channel to permanent residence, is closed to new applications: work permit filings stopped on 19 December 2025, intake of new permanent residence applications stopped at 23:59 on 31 December 2025, and from 1 January 2026 intake is zero until further notice. There is one exception: holders of commitment certificates issued by designated organisations in 2025 could file until 30 June 2026. The Self-Employed Persons Program has been paused since April 2024 with no resumption date.

Timelines and procedure. The reason for the closure is arithmetic: by October 2025 roughly 43,200 cases had accumulated in the queue with processing times above ten years, while the 2026–2028 levels plan allots the category around 500 places a year. Cases filed earlier are processed with priority for applications backed by designated investors.

Presence and renewal. For those already inside the system the ordinary rules apply: a work permit can be extended, and permanent resident status requires 730 days of physical presence in five years.

Tax effect. Canadian residence means worldwide income taxation, and severing residence triggers the departure tax — a deemed disposition of assets. This is not a side detail: for someone with a portfolio, the exit charge is often the single largest line item of the route.

Reform status. A "more targeted" entrepreneur pilot has been announced, but the criteria, volumes and filing procedure are unpublished — until the regulations appear, nothing can be planned around it. A separate line remains the Quebec Immigrant Investor Program (QIIP): as designed, a government-guaranteed CAD 1m investment for five years plus a non-refundable CAD 200,000 contribution, two stages with roughly six months of temporary residence in Quebec and — the filter that removes most candidates — conversational French at level 7 of 12. QIIP operates through intake windows with quotas; the state of intake must be checked on the specific date.

Australia: investment no longer buys status

What is bought. Formally, nothing that can be paid for. The Business Innovation and Investment Program closed to new applications on 31 July 2024; subclasses 188 and 132, including the Significant Investor stream at AUD 5m, no longer accept applicants. For those left in the queue, a visa application charge refund mechanism was introduced for withdrawals of applications filed before the closure in the listed streams. The only remaining channel is the National Innovation Visa (subclass 858): a permanent visa for individuals with an internationally recognised record of exceptional and outstanding achievement.

Timelines and procedure. Speed is determined not by the file but by priority. Ministerial Direction 120, in force from 25 July 2026 in place of Direction 112, set out five tiers: holders of top-level awards (a Nobel Prize, a Fields Medal, Olympic gold); those nominated by a government body on Form 1000; outstanding candidates in tier-one sectors (critical technologies, renewable energy and low-emissions technology, the health industry); tier-two sectors (agri-food and AgTech, defence and space, education, financial services and fintech, infrastructure and transport, resources); and everyone else.

Presence and renewal. The visa is permanent from grant, so there is nothing to renew; the obligations of a permanent resident and the rules on returning to the country still apply.

Tax effect. Australian residence is a worldwide-income regime with capital gains tax and dense reporting. The route offers no preferential regime for new residents.

Reform status and what to check. Direction 120 does not create a new visa and does not guarantee a grant: the applicant must still evidence outstanding achievement through grants, publications, patents or international recognition, and priority merely sets the position in the processing queue. Two things must be checked before filing: whether the profile falls within tier 1 or 2 under the current version of the direction, and whether there is a realistic prospect of a government body nomination, which lifts the application straight to the second tier. The general logic of such routes is set out in Migration routes for talent.

New Zealand: Active Investor Plus

What is bought. The Active Investor Plus visa, relaunched in April 2025, is the only fully functioning investment programme of the developed world on this map, and it is built in two categories. Growth: NZ$5m into managed funds or direct investments from a list approved by New Zealand Trade and Enterprise, held for three years. Balanced: NZ$10m into a wider set — government, municipal and corporate bonds, listed equities, philanthropy, new residential development or new or existing commercial and industrial property — held for five years. The status granted is a resident visa, not a temporary one.

Timelines and procedure. After approval in principle there are six months to deploy the capital, extendable to twelve. The checkpoints are 24 and 36 months for Growth, 24 and 60 months for Balanced; at each one a questionnaire on investment activity is completed. Demand built quickly: by 15 December 2025, 491 applications covering 1,571 people had been filed and 129 visas approved (99 Growth, 30 Balanced), with potential investment of NZ$2.91bn; the leading source countries are China, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia and India.

Presence and renewal. This is the key difference from the competitors that have closed. Growth requires just 21 days in New Zealand across the three-year investment period. Balanced requires 105 days over five years, but the requirement falls by 14 days for each million above the threshold, up to a maximum of 42 days: at NZ$13m, 63 days remain.

Tax effect. At that level of presence tax residence usually does not arise — and that is deliberate design. For those who do relocate, a transitional exemption is available: a new migrant or a returning New Zealander who has not been resident for the preceding ten years pays no tax for roughly four years on most foreign income — interest, dividends, overseas rents; foreign employment income and personal services income fall outside the relief, and it can be used only once in a lifetime. There is no general capital gains tax, but the FIF regime applies to foreign portfolios, with the new Revenue Account Method. The trap: from 6 March 2026 AIP holders may buy one residential property from NZ$5m without being resident, but acquiring a permanent home can create a "permanent place of abode" and tax residence along with it. Detail: New Zealand: investor residence, tax without CGT and citizenship.

Panama: the Qualified Investor and the window to 15 October 2026

What is bought. The subcategoría de residente permanente en calidad de inversionista calificado, created by Executive Decree 722 of 15 October 2020 and amended by Decree 193 of 2024, is a rare format in which investment grants permanent residence at once, skipping the temporary stage. Three options: property from $300,000, securities through a licensed Panamanian broker from $500,000, or a five-year fixed bank deposit from $750,000. The funds must come from abroad and the investment must be held for at least five years.

Timelines and procedure. A decision takes around thirty days and no physical presence is needed to file — the case is submitted through a Panamanian lawyer. The mandatory preliminary stage is bank compliance: without a source-of-funds review there is no point launching the application.

Presence and renewal. There is no published minimum stay; practice assumes a visit to the country at least once every two years so that the status is not treated as abandoned. Naturalisation is possible after five years of permanent residence, subject to an examination in Spanish and civics, and the decision remains discretionary.

Tax effect. Panama is a territorial jurisdiction: income earned outside the country is not taxed. But the residence permit itself does not create tax residence — that requires presence or a centre of vital interests, and the tax residence certificate is issued separately. This is the standard fork described in Residence by investment and tax residence: here status and tax effect are decoupled.

Reform status and what to check. The map's principal deadline: the property threshold stays at $300,000 only until 15 October 2026, after which it rises to $500,000. Practice allows filing on the basis of a purchase agreement signed before that date without completing the transaction, but that is practice, not rule — it is verified with a Panamanian lawyer against the specific property. The cheaper line for nationals of friendly countries is the Friendly Nations Visa, where the property threshold is $200,000 but the status is temporary first.

Paraguay: the Investor Pass

What is bought. Resolution 283/2026 of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, in force from 28 April 2026, introduced the Investor Pass — a foreign investor certificate (Certificado de Inversionista Extranjero) opening direct access to permanent residence without passing through a temporary stage. Thresholds are differentiated by type of investment: $70,000 for manufacturing projects that create jobs, $150,000 for tourism infrastructure, $200,000 for financial instruments and $200,000 for commercial property. Financial instruments must be held for at least two years with annual reporting; manufacturing and tourism projects require a business plan.

Timelines and procedure. Under the regulation the certificate is issued no later than five working days after a complete file is received. Then come three trips to Paraguay: filing through the state SUACE system, applying for the identity card and collecting it from the National Police. The file includes a criminal record certificate with Interpol checks and proof of source of funds; documents evidencing available funds must be dated no earlier than 180 days before filing.

Presence and renewal. There are effectively no stay requirements for maintaining the status. They appear on the road to citizenship: three years of permanent residence, absence from the country of no more than three consecutive months a year, demonstrated ties through work or business, an examination in history and culture, and Spanish at A1. Naturalisation goes through the courts and remains discretionary.

Tax effect. Paraguay is a territorial jurisdiction with some of the lowest rates in the region; foreign income is outside the tax base. Registration under the Investor Pass confers taxpayer status and access to the resident regime but, as in Panama, does not create tax residence automatically. Detail: Paraguay: residence after the 2022 reform and territorial tax.

Reform status and what to check. The route is new and practice is still settling: before filing, check the current version of the resolution and the list of accepted investment forms. Separately, the banking side — opening an account for the investment remains the bottleneck for non-residents.

Uruguay: residence and the tax holiday after Ley 20.446

What is bought. Uruguay sells not migration status but a tax regime, and from 1 January 2026 the price rose several times over. Ley 20.446, enacted as part of the 2025–2029 budget, rewrote the investment grounds for tax residence: property must now be worth around $2m (12.5m indexed units) against roughly $590,000 under the old rules, or around $100,000 a year must be contributed to the national innovation fund for eleven consecutive years. The third ground is unchanged — presence of more than 183 days in a calendar year.

Timelines and procedure. Tax residence is confirmed at year end through the DGI; legal residence (residencia legal) is a separate process, and neither follows automatically from the other.

Presence and renewal. The investment ground allows the 183 days to be avoided, but it requires the absence of tax residence in another jurisdiction — in practice a harder test than the investment sum itself.

Tax effect. The core of the product is the holiday: eleven years (the year of acquiring the status plus ten calendar years) free of tax on foreign income. After that there are three forks: ordinary taxation; a 50% IRPF reduction for a further five years on new investment or continued contributions to the innovation fund; or a fixed annual payment of roughly $200,000–315,000 for up to twenty years. Outside the holiday the rate on foreign capital income is 12%, and from 2026 it applies more widely than before, including rental receipts through non-resident structures and capital gains. Participants who entered the regime before 2025 are protected by a grandfathering clause.

Reform status and what to check. The mechanics of the fixed payment are governed by secondary legislation drafted after the statute was passed: on the filing date, verify the current version of the regulation and the indexed unit rate — the dollar equivalent of the threshold floats. Full analysis: Uruguay: tax residence and tax holidays.

Brazil: VITEM IX

What is bought. The VITEM IX investor residence is entry not into a tax regime but into a market: 220 million people, the largest economy in Latin America and full membership of Mercosur. The base threshold is R$500,000 into the capital of a Brazilian company; for projects in innovation, research and activities of heightened significance the threshold falls to R$150,000. The first step is incorporating a legal entity: the visa is tied to the role of administrator or shareholder, so building the structure is not a separate task but part of the route.

Timelines and procedure. The company is registered before filing, the investment is evidenced by registering the foreign capital with the Central Bank, and only then is the visa and residence application made. A business plan is required: what is assessed is not just the sum but the reality of the project.

Presence and renewal. The initial status is fixed-term, renewable on confirmation that the capital remains invested and the business matches the plan submitted; a transition to indefinite residence follows. Naturalisation in Brazil runs under the general rules of the migration statute, and for an investor that is a separate track, not an automatic continuation of the status.

Tax effect. The key difference from Panama and Paraguay: Brazil taxes residents on worldwide income at progressive rates up to 27.5%, and residence arises quickly — on receipt of a permanent visa or after 183 days of presence within twelve months. There is no preferential regime for new residents, and reporting on foreign assets and controlled structures is among the most detailed in the region. This is a decision for those genuinely building a business here.

Reform status and what to check. Thresholds and business-plan requirements are set by normative resolutions and revised regularly; a separate property line with higher sums exists, but its parameters vary by region and must be checked against the resolution in force on the filing date.

Chile: investor residence in an OECD jurisdiction

What is bought. Chile is the underrated entry: the only South American OECD member with an investor migration channel, yet without a golden visa. The investor subcategory of temporary residence under Law 21,325 requires a minimum of $500,000 invested in the production of goods or services — a passive property purchase gives nothing. A mandatory condition is a sponsorship letter from the state agency InvestChile, which assesses the project before the migration service begins its review. A parallel line exists for executives and specialists of companies in which a foreign investor holds at least 10% of the voting rights.

Timelines and procedure. The application is filed only from abroad, through the digital SERMIG platform. The InvestChile stage takes around two to four weeks, migration processing one to three months. The file includes a passport valid for at least a year, a criminal record certificate no older than 60 days and the investment documentation.

Presence and renewal. The permit is granted for two years and renewed for a further two on confirmation that the investment has been made and the company's tax filings are in order. Permanent residence is available after two years of temporary residence, provided there were at least twelve months of actual presence and the investment was held for eighteen consecutive months; citizenship follows after five years of residence in total.

Tax effect. Chile taxes residents on worldwide income, but newcomers benefit from a preferential period during which foreign income is excluded from the base, extendable on application. That makes Chile a rare combination: reputationally first-world, a real economy, and a window for reorganising assets before entering the full regime. The boundaries of the relief and the extension procedure are the first thing to verify with a local tax adviser: the rule sits in the income tax law and its detail has changed.

Reform status and what to check. The risk here runs the other way: the government consistently declines to create an investment migration product, and attempts to "top up" status with property or a deposit do not work. Before filing, check InvestChile's requirements as to the substance of the project and the source of funds — that is the stage at which most applications fall away.

Argentina: a framework without parameters

What is bought. Decree 524/2025 of 31 July 2025 created the Agency for Citizenship by Investment Programmes and opened the possibility of obtaining Argentine citizenship for a "significant investment" without meeting the residence qualification — where ordinary naturalisation requires two years of continuous residence. The problem is that the decree itself names no sums: the criteria for what makes an investment significant are to be set by the Ministry of Economy.

Timelines and procedure. A five-step scheme: application to the agency, assessment of the investment against economic criteria, checks through the Ministry of Security, the financial intelligence unit, the criminal records registry and the intelligence service, a recommendation from the agency, and a decision by the National Migration Directorate within thirty days. Adverse check results lead to automatic refusal.

Presence and renewal. On the investment route the presence requirement is removed by design; on the ordinary route it is two years of residence, after which naturalisation is granted through the courts.

Tax effect. Argentina taxes residents on worldwide income and retains a personal assets tax (bienes personales) covering foreign assets too — on that measure it is the closest on this map to the European model. Acquiring citizenship without moving tax residence creates no tax consequences in itself: passport and tax status are decoupled here just as they are in Panama. For most people the workable construction is legal residence followed by naturalisation after two years, rather than the investment route: see Milei's Argentina: residence, citizenship in two years and taxes.

Reform status and what to check. It is premature to treat this route as a live product: without published criteria for a "significant investment" and without settled agency practice this is a framework, not a programme, and any figures quoted by advisers as at August 2026 remain estimates. Exactly one thing needs checking — whether the Ministry of Economy has issued secondary legislation with sums and a list of eligible investments. Separately, the general backdrop counts: migration regulation under the current administration has been revised repeatedly, and easing on one line has come with tightening on others.

Mexico: not a programme but a wealth threshold

What is bought. Mexico has no separate investor programme — there is a test of economic solvency tied to indicators that are indexed annually and rose noticeably in 2026. For temporary residence, consulates require monthly income of around $4,400 over six months or savings of about $74,700 over twelve months. For permanent residence, income of about $7,400 a month or savings of around $298,800. The investment alternatives: unencumbered Mexican property worth from roughly $598,000, or an investment of about $300,000 in a Mexican company or in the shares of a listed issuer.

Timelines and procedure. Filing is at the consulate of residence; after approval, entry and exchange for a resident card within thirty days. Asset types cannot be combined, documents must be in the applicant's own name, and consular discretion here is wider than in most jurisdictions on this map: the same file can produce different outcomes at different consulates.

Presence and renewal. Temporary residence is granted for up to four years — an initial year plus renewals — after which the transition to permanent residence opens without a fresh solvency test. A permanent resident loses the status after more than two consecutive years outside the country, but there is currently no requirement as to days per year, which makes Mexican status a convenient fallback while life continues in another jurisdiction.

Tax effect. Mexico taxes residents on worldwide income at progressive rates; tax residence is determined primarily by the centre of vital interests rather than day count, so relocating without severing the previous residence readily creates dual residence. Analysis: Mexico: residence and taxes.

Reform status and what to check. The main practical risk is indexation: thresholds are recalculated at the start of the year, and a file assembled on last year's figures is turned away. Before filing, verify the current requirements with the specific consulate.

The Caribbean: in a single line

The five Caribbean citizenship-by-investment programmes — Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia — formally sit within the Americas perimeter but run on different logic: not residence but a passport outright, from a $200,000 fund contribution, with minimal presence or none. As at August 2026 a deadline hangs over them: the European Union has demanded the programmes be wound up by 2028 on pain of losing visa-free access to the Schengen area — and it is the visa-free access that constitutes the core value of these passports. Analysis: Caribbean citizenship programmes: the EU's 2028 deadline and Citizenship by investment: Caribbean programmes and the alternatives. Their one practical application on this map: a Grenadian passport remains the gateway to the American E-2 visa — and that effect too depends on whether the programmes survive 2028.