Malta after the CJEU ruling: what remains possible

The Court's reasoning matters as much as its verdict. It held that a Member State cannot make its nationality — and with it EU citizenship and free movement across the Union — available in exchange for predetermined payments or investments. Citizenship, in the Court's view, rests on a genuine bond between a person and a state, not on a commercial transaction. That is why the judgment reached Malta's programme specifically: it was structured as citizenship by investment with a set contribution, and that structure is what the Court found incompatible with EU law.

The practical timeline is short and settled. The ruling came on 29 April 2025; Malta repealed the programme on 24 July 2025 through Act XXI of 2025. From that point there is no application to make: the scheme that let an applicant obtain a Maltese — and therefore EU — passport for a defined investment no longer exists. Any offer you see today promising a Maltese passport for a fixed sum is describing a route that has been closed by law.

What the ruling did not do is unwind the past. Citizenships already granted before the repeal remain valid; the people who obtained them keep their status and their passports. The judgment governs what Malta may offer going forward, not a retroactive revocation. If you already hold Maltese citizenship, nothing here changes your position — but if you were counting on the programme as a future option, that option is gone.

Two lawful paths remain, and it is important not to confuse them with what was lost. Malta still runs the MPRP, which grants permanent residence — the right to live in Malta and travel in the Schengen area — but not citizenship and not a passport. Separately, Malta retains a discretionary, merit-based naturalisation with no fixed amount and no investment tariff; it is not a purchasable route and should not be marketed as one. And if an EU passport is genuinely your goal, the honest comparison now runs through residence-first programmes in other member states — a Portuguese or Greek golden visa can, over years of real residence, lead to naturalisation, but on their timelines and conditions, not on a Maltese shortcut. Confirm the current terms of any of these with the relevant government authority before you plan around them.