Malta · Citizenship by investment
Citizenship by Naturalisation for Exceptional Services by Direct Investment
Struck down by the CJEU (Grand Chamber) in Case C-181/23, European Commission v Republic of Malta, 29 April 2025. Malta repealed the investment route via the Maltese Citizenship (Amendment) Act — Act XXI of 2025, published and in force 24 July 2025. No new applications. This was the last direct citizenship-by-investment programme in the European Union.
This is the single most consequential citizenship ruling in EU history: the Court held that a member state's grant of nationality — traditionally an exclusive sovereign competence — is constrained by EU law where it commercialises Union citizenship. Every remaining EU-adjacent 'passport' pitch should now be read against it, and any adviser still marketing a Maltese passport route in 2026 is selling something that does not exist.
Qualifying routes
route abolished 24 July 2025
route abolished 24 July 2025
The facts
- Minimum investment
- €600k
- Total landed cost
- Historically EUR 600k–750k contribution plus EUR 10k philanthropic donation, property purchase from EUR 700k or rent from EUR 16k per year held five years, plus due diligence and agent fees — roughly EUR 900k–1.2m all-in for a single applicant. Academic only: the route no longer exists.
- Timeline
- 12–36 months — historic; 12- or 36-month residence tiers
- Physical presence
- Historically minimal — the CJEU noted applicants needed only two physical appearances in Malta, which was central to its finding that no genuine link existed
- Family
- spousechildren under 29 (dependent)parents and grandparents over 55 (dependent)
- Permanent residency
- n/a — conferred citizenship directly
- Citizenship
- closed
- Language test
- none was required
- Dual citizenship
- Permitted
- Requirements
- no longer applicable
- The programme is gone. Treat any 2026 marketing offering 'Malta citizenship by investment', 'MEIN' or a 'last window' as a red flag — several intermediaries continued advertising it after 24 July 2025.
- The CJEU's reasoning — that granting nationality for predetermined payments without a genuine prior link breaches Article 20 TFEU and the Article 4(3) TEU duty of sincere cooperation — is precedent that reaches beyond Malta and constrains any future EU scheme.
- Existing Maltese citizens naturalised under the scheme are not stripped of citizenship by the judgment itself, but the Court's language about mutual trust means holders should expect elevated scrutiny at banks and in onboarding for years.
- The Court expressly rejected Malta's argument that only 'general and systematic' breaches engage EU law — narrowing the defence available to any successor scheme.