The Magnetic Pull of Passports: Which Documents Attract Russian Businessmen
Table of Contents
Passport Power
Depending on the methodology, different companies rank various countries first in terms of passport power in 2024.
Henley & Partners ranks France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Singapore, and Spain first. Their passports allow visa-free entry to 194 countries. Finland, the Netherlands, South Korea, and Sweden are in second place, with access to 193 countries. Austria, Denmark, Ireland, Luxembourg, and the United Kingdom are in third. The USA is in 6th place, UAE in 11th, Cyprus in 14th, and Russia in 52nd.
The Passport Index ranks countries differently, placing the UAE first with access to 179 countries. France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Spain, Austria, and Switzerland share second place, with their passports allowing visa-free entry to 177 countries. Sweden, Belgium, Finland, and Ireland are in third place, with access to 176 countries. The USA is also in 6th place, Cyprus in 9th, and Russia in 36th.
New Passport
We do not aim for an exhaustive sample and gather news about businessmen changing citizenship from open sources. Links to the materials used are provided at the end of the article.
Timur Turlov (Freedom Holding) obtained a passport of Kazakhstan and lives in Kazakhstan.
Ruben Vardanyan (Troika Dialog) obtained a passport of Armenia. He is currently in Azerbaijan.
Yuri Milner (DST Global) received a passport from Israel.
Nikolay Storonsky (Revolut) received a passport from the UK and lives in the UK.
Oleg Tinkov (Tinkoff Group) received a passport from Cyprus. He lives in Italy.
Igor Makarov (Areti Group) received a passport from Cyprus.
Ratmir Timashev (Veeam Software) received a passport from Cyprus, lives in the USA.
Andrey Baronov (Veeam Software) received a passport from Cyprus, lives in Switzerland.
Mikhail Kokorich (Tekhnosila) received a passport from Switzerland and lives in the USA.
Vasily Anisimov (private investor) obtained a passport of Croatia, and lives in Croatia.
Pavel Durov (Telegram) obtained a passport of the UAE and lives in the UAE.
It appears that, based on a subjective price-to-quality ratio, Russian millionaires are most interested in citizenship by investment. Specifically, an EU passport obtained through a €5m investment in the Cypriot economy seems like a reasonable solution to them.
According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 23.5 thousand people renounced Russian citizenship in 2022, while 13.6 thousand people acquired it. From January to September 2023, approximately 4.4 thousand people renounced Russian citizenship, and 15 thousand people were granted Russian citizenship.
- https://www.henleyglobal.com/passport-index/ranking
- https://www.passportindex.org/byRank.php
- https://www.forbes.ru/milliardery/483156-i-byl-takov-kto-iz-ucastnikov-spiska-forbes-otkazalsa-ot-rossijskogo-grazdanstva?image=481527
- https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/6453273?utm_source=yxnews&utm_medium=desktop&utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fdzen.ru%2Fnews%2Fsearch%3Ftext%3D
- https://aif.ru/society/mid_rf_4_4_tys_chelovek_otkazalis_ot_rossiyskogo_grazhdanstva_v_2023_godu