Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to drive away over 15,000 millionaires from the country

According to a recently conducted analysis of migration data, more than 15,000 millionaires are expected to drive away from Russia this year. The turning away of wealthy Russian citizens comes as leader Vladimir Putin’s regime continues with the aggressive invasion of Ukraine.

According to projects based on migration data by Henley & Partners, a London-based firm which acts as matchmaker between the wealthy individuals and countries which are selling their citizenships, “About 15 per cent of Russians with more than $1m (£820,000) in ready assets are expected to have emigrated to other countries by the end of 2022.”

War is sucking out the Russian assets

“Russia [is] haemorrhaging millionaires,” said Andrew Amoils, the head of research at New World Wealth, which compiled the data for Henley. “Affluent individuals have been emigrating from Russia in steadily rising numbers every year over the past decade, an early warning sign of the current problems the country is facing. Historically, major country collapses have usually been preceded by an acceleration in emigration of wealthy people, who are often the first to leave as they have the means to do so.”

Ukraine is suffering ever more

The war is rendering gravest implications on Ukraine. The country is projected to suffer the maximum loss of ‘high net worth individuals’ (HNWIs) in proportion to its population – about 2,800 millionaires (or 42% of all HNWIs in Ukraine) being expected to have left the country by the end of this year.

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Prospected destinations

Apart from US and UK, a large number of millionaires are also expected to move to “the three Ms” – Malta, Mauritius and Monaco.

“Malta has been one of Europe’s great success stories of the past decade, not just in terms of millionaire migration but also in terms of overall wealth growth,” Amoils said. “It is currently one of the world’s fastest-growing markets, with US dollar wealth growth of 87% between 2011 and 2021. Its citizenship by naturalisation process has brought substantial new wealth to the island nation and has been credited with propelling Malta’s strong growth in multiple sectors including financial services, IT and real estate. Approximately 300 millionaires are expected to move to Malta in 2022.”

Furthermore, according to the Africa Wealth Report 2022, Mauritius now has 4,800 HNWIs when compared with 2,700 about a decade ago. Mauritius is described by Henley as a “wealth magnet” because of the “creation of an international financial centre offering significant tax breaks”.

Monaco has always the super-rich from across the world as it is a zero tax country – no income tax, capital gains tax or property tax.