continent and corner of the world . From South Africa and Moscow to India and Brazil , the great Easter egg hunt is on .
It is estimated that the top four countries providing investors , besides China , would be India , Vietnam , Brazil and South Korea . More empirical data by NES Financial shows that for the first time in history , the amount of investment being placed into escrow from India topped the amount coming from China in November of 2017 .
This rapid growth in countries such as India and Brazil , which lack an experienced agent network capable of providing SOF reporting in-house , has led to the need for outsourced SOF reports by experienced accounting firms and service providers to fill in the gap .
Most EB-5 veterans are used to doing the majority of their marketing in China , since the area traditionally has been the source of 85 percent of all investors in the EB-5 marketplace .
This huge demand has led to backlogs and waiting of 10 years or more for Chinese investors . The market was the most mature in the world , mainly due to its infrastructure and agent network that was well developed before the EB-5 boom of 2010 .
This infrastructure included tier 1 and tier 2 agents that had large staffs capable of understanding source of funds ( SOF ) and presenting SOF packages to U . S . immigration attorneys that was usually more than 70 percent complete .
This led to a very efficient system that allowed for the facilitation of a large number of investors from China to flow into the U . S . via the EB-5 program .
DUE TO RETROGRESSION , A SHIFTING MARKET
Now that China has retrogressed to such a long wait , it is expected that the number of investors coming from China will drop by an estimated 80 percent by the fall of 2018 .
This has led regional center operators and stakeholders on a global diversification to set up their niche for nearly every
WITHOUT INFRASTRUCTURE , AGENTS AND CHEAP LABOR , NO SOURCE OF FUNDS IN MASS NUMBERS
With the lack of a local infrastructure in place , it is not possible for most firms to keep up with the large volume of cases coming in from so many diverse countries across the globe . Each country requires legal and accounting staff that speak the local language and understand the issues affecting the SOF and path of funds in each country . Looking at the top four countries in terms of specific challenges , there are a few hurdles for each .
INDIA
The country has remittance restrictions of $ 250,000 per person per fiscal year . These are under the RBI liberalized scheme and the ancillary requirements of where such remittances can be sent . In other words , you have to make sure the transfers are going for a specific purpose .
Since India has a large cash-based economy , it can be a challenge dealing with property sales and the issue of “ black money ,” which is funds earned from the black market that have avoided taxation , and tracing where the cash came from in a property sale . There are multiple languages in India , making it difficult in smaller markets where English is less prevalent .
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