"We have felt in the last few months and also felt last year, until the beginning of the pandemic, a greater demand from investors", said one of the partners of the firm Rato, Ling, Lei & Cortés - Lawyers.

“This is part of the strategy of having an office in Macau that gives us access to the Chinese market, Hong Kong and the market here in South Asia, and we feel that these markets have a greater appetite to invest in Portugal”, while the office in Portuguese territory has received most of the requests, underlined Pedro Cortés.

“Since the approval of the State Budget Law of 2020, which allowed a revision by the Government of the golden visa law, we started to have requests from clients.

Un I Wong said that the interest is mainly focused on the real estate market, but also on investment funds, in addition to the transfer of capital to bank accounts in Portugal, with the average individual investment being between €350,000 and €500,000.

Pedro Cortés stressed that much of the demand has been felt lately “not only for golden visas”, not least because now “investors start to understand the market better and have other options” like “D2 and D7, which are investments for qualified personnel to be able to establish themselves in Portugal with less financial requirements”.

"Our immigration area has been very busy", summarised the lawyer.

The end of golden visas for foreign real estate investors on the coast and metropolitan areas of Lisbon and Porto will come into effect on 1 January, 2022.

The new regime will only allow residence permits in Portugal to anyone who invests in residential properties located in the Autonomous Regions of the Azores and Madeira or in the interior regions.

The bill also contains changes regarding the required investment amounts, increasing the minimum investment amounts, as when opting for capital transfers (increases 500 thousand Euros to 1.5 million Euros) or for investing in scientific research activities (rises from 350 thousand Euros to 500 thousand Euros).

To create a company or obtain a golden visa through the purchase of investment units in investment funds or venture capital funds dedicated to the capitalisation of companies, the minimum value also rises from 350 thousand to 500 thousand Euros.

Chinese investment alone obtained through gold visas amounted to more than eight years of the program, until the end of February, more than 2,700 million Euros, according to data from the Foreigners and Borders Service (SEF).