UK has issued a total of 198 tier 1 investor visas for the year Jan-Jun 2018. According to latest UK immigration report, 96 visas issued for Q1 2018 and 92 visas for Q2 2018. These wealthy investors brought over 300 family members.
On June 2018, The UK Government announced some changes to the Tier1 investor category.
7.11. The Tier 1 (Investor) category is for high net worth individuals making an investment of at least £2 million in the UK. The following changes are being made to this category:
- Applicants are required to maintain their investments. A change is being made to clarify that, while applicants may withdraw interest and dividend payments generated by their qualifying investments from their portfolios, they may not do so if these were generated before the applicant purchased the portfolio.
- As evidence of their investment, applicants must currently submit portfolio reports signed off by a financial institution regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. A technical change is being made to require institutions to confirm that the funds have only been invested in qualifying investments, and that no loan has been secured against those funds. This change will put a further obligation on financial firms to scrutinise the suitability of applicants’ investments, in addition to their own due diligence.
The per country statistics is only available for Q1, which shows 28 wealthy Chinese received Tier 1 visas paying £2 million, followed by Russians
| UK Tier1 Investor Visas (Main Apps) | Q1 2018 | Q2 2018 | Total |
| China | 28 | 32 | 60 |
| Russia | 8 | 13 | 21 |
| Hong Kong | 9 | 4 | 13 |
| India | 8 | 0 | 8 |
| Turkey | 5 | 2 | 7 |
| United States | 3 | 4 | 7 |
| Australia | 1 | 5 | 6 |
| Pakistan | 3 | 3 | 6 |
| Canada | 2 | 3 | 5 |
| South Africa | 3 | 2 | 5 |
| Israel | 1 | 3 | 4 |
| Ukraine | 2 | 2 | 4 |
| Japan | 3 | 0 | 3 |
| Kazakhstan | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Saudi Arabia | 0 | 3 | 3 |
| Taiwan | 2 | 1 | 3 |
| Brazil | 0 | 2 | 2 |
| Dominica | 0 | 2 | 2 |
| Indonesia | 0 | 2 | 2 |
| Iran | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| Jordan | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| Malaysia | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| Mexico | 0 | 2 | 2 |
| Qatar | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| Singapore | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| Azerbaijan | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Bahrain | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Belarus | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Egypt | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Honduras | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Kuwait | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Macau | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Nigeria | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| St. Kitts and Nevis | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Thailand | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Vietnam | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Yemen | 1 | 0 | 1 |
Table Credit: Mr. Farzin Yazdi, Head of Investor Visa, Shard Capital, UK
Data Source: Gov.uk
