What are the requirements for opening a company in Cyprus under the citizenship-by-investment program?

Thank you for your query. It is possible to incorporate a Cyprus Company, which will acquire the investment. Yes, definitely it will be possible either to incorporate a new Cyprus Company subsidiary to the Ukraine company or to relocate the Company to Cyprus, in case this is allowed and provided by the article of association of the Company.

Initially, I would like to inform you that investments for Cyprus citizenship programme can be made either personally by the investor, either by his/ her spouse, or jointly with the spouse or even through a company in which they are participating as shareholders or as ultimate beneficial owners. Please bear in mind that, if the applicant invests through a company in which he/ she participates as a shareholder only a percentage of the investment will be taken into consideration in proportion to his holding percentage. A foreign company can relocate to Cyprus, provided that the legislation of the country of origin allows such re-domiciliation. Also, the Articles of Association of the company must provide for the continuation of the company under the legal status of another approved country or jurisdiction. The foreign company must first apply for the re-domiciliation out of its country to the Company Registrar of the foreign country. Once the national procedures of the country of the foreign company are finalized, the foreign company must apply to the Registrar of Companies of Cyprus to be registered in Cyprus as a "Continuing Company". Our law firm can manage the re-domiciliation process on behalf of the foreign company. We will arrange for the approval of the company name, which must be the same as the foreign company, except with the abbreviation of "Ltd" at the end. Then an application for re-domiciliation along with all appropriate supporting documentation should be prepared and filed. Once the Registrar is satisfied that the documents submitted are in accordance with the law, temporarily deposits the relevant documents and certifies that the foreign company is temporarily registered as a continued entity in the Republic of Cyprus as from the date of such registration and it will issue the Temporary Certificate of Continuation of the Company in Cyprus. From the date of issuing of the temporary registration the foreign company is considered as a legal person duly incorporated according to the Laws of Cyprus and it has the same liabilities and is eligible to exercise all powers that registered companies have according to the Laws of Cyprus. The registration procedure is completed within five (5) to seven (7) working days under the accelerated procedure or within fifteen (15) to twenty (20) working days under normal procedure from the date the application was duly submitted. Please note that the foreign company must not be removed/ canceled from the foreign registry before the Cyprus Registrar issues the Temporary Certificate of Continuation. The application to cancel its registration in the foreign registry must be made only after the Temporary Certificate of Continuation is issued in Cyprus. Once the certificate of discontinuance is presented evidencing that the foreign company has stopped to be a company registered in the country of initial incorporation, namely canceled from being registered abroad, the Cyprus Registrar issues the final certificate of continuation, which certifies that the foreign company has been registered in the Republic. If you are interested in the above procedure, please do not hesitate to contact us for more details on the requested documentation to accompany the application and on citizenship application requirements.

In order to register a company in Cyprus and to open a corporate account, the following KYC documents are needed: passport copies, a recent copy of a utility bill, C.V., source of income, clean criminal record (in case the bank requests as such), bank statement (6 months old). Given that the company is registered and the account is activated, you may transfer the amount of investment (i.e. 2.000.000 euros plus VAT) in your own corporate account in Cyprus, and through that to proceed with investments in the Republic of Cyprus. Please note that by transferring money to your own corporate account cannot be considered as an investment under the Cyprus Passport Investment Regulations.

The criterion with regards to creation or participation in a Cyprus business states that an investor should setup or participation in the form of equity in the share capital of a Cyprus based business which employees at least 5 Cypriot or EU nationals who have been residing in Cyprus in the last 5 years. In that sense, it might be easier, less expensive, more simple and less time consuming to set up a Cyprus company rather than relocating your Ukrainian company to Cyprus. Thereafter, you can transfer the business from Ukraine to Cyprus.