Global wealth management firm Edelweiss Capital Group has said that its internal data shows a growing trend in high net worth individuals and families from the United States seeking to emigrate abroad, with Portugal emerging as a highly favored option.

Annette Karman, Managing Director and the head of the firm’s client relations team, said that its immigration investment and offshore asset protection business has “skyrocketed in the past three years”, as wealthy Americans are giving in to “a strong sense of frustration about high crime, rising prices and an increasingly polarized social climate, not to mention a draconian regime of taxation, including on worldwide income.”

The United States is one of the only countries in the world that taxes its citizens and permanent residents on income earned abroad. It also requires banks and other financial institutions to make disclosures about their clients, pursuant to laws such as the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act.

Karman says that the younger generation of wealthy individuals has an “increasingly global lifestyle”, many of whom are not necessarily rooted to any one location. For these reasons, the option of acquiring another citizenship is becoming more and more attractive. 

European countries such as Portugal, Greece and Malta offer so-called “golden visas” or immigration-by-investment schemes, offering naturalization to wealthy individuals as a means of bringing in much-needed investor capital onshore. As an added lure, new citizens of these countries will also have full access to the European Union. Other countries offering such programs include St. Lucia, St. Kitts and Nevis, and Dominica.

Edelweiss started out as an estate planning advisory firm in Bern, Switzerland in 1973. However, according to Karman, the firm now offers a full suite of financial and lifestyle solutions to a global clientele of high net worth individuals and families, including family office and trust services, investments and asset management. It began offering immigration-by-investment services in 2021 to cater to “high demand” from its client base.

Media Contact
Company Name: Edelweiss Capital Group
Contact Person: Rachel Symons
Email: Send Email
Country: United States
Website: https://edelweisscapital.com/