Individuals who make a substantial financial investment in the state are eligible for a facilitated naturalisation with a shortened residence period.

[2] In 1530, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor granted the archipelago of Malta as a fiefdom to the Knights Hospitaller after their loss of Rhodes to the Ottoman Empire.

While local residents deeply resented being traded away without consultation, the Order of Saint John maintained its rule over the islands for the next 268 years until the French invasion of Malta in 1798.

[4] The 1802 Treaty of Amiens restored Malta to the Order but the organisation had been thrown into disarray following its 1798 defeat, which made enforcing this provision impossible.

Regardless of the treaty, local residents vehemently opposed restoring the Knights to power and opted for continued British rule.

Britain itself decided against leaving Malta after considering its strategic military value in the Mediterranean Sea following resumption of the Napoleonic Wars.

[7] Although Malta was granted self-governance in 1921, nationality and naturalisation remained reserved matters under the jurisdiction of the imperial government.

[9][10] All British subjects/Commonwealth citizens under the reformed system initially held an automatic right to settle in the United Kingdom and Ireland.

[11][12] Non-white immigration into the UK was systemically discouraged, but strong economic conditions in Britain following the Second World War attracted an unprecedented wave of colonial migration.

[15][12] Britain somewhat relaxed these measures in 1971 for patrials, subjects whose parents or grandparents were born in the United Kingdom,[14] which gave effective preferential treatment to white Commonwealth citizens.

Although a plurality of voters chose a closer union with Britain in a 1956 referendum, disagreements between the British and Maltese governments over the UK's financial contributions to the territory after integration ultimately led to a collapse of negotiations.

[19] Commonwealth and Irish citizens remain technically defined in Maltese law as non-foreign, but there are no benefits provided to either group.

Children born overseas to Maltese mothers between 21 September 1964 and 1 August 1989 also gained eligibility to register as citizens with no requirement to reside in Malta.

Individuals with a Maltese-born lineal ascendant who died before 1 August 2007 and who themself had a parent born in Malta may acquire citizenship by registration.

[28] Maltese citizens have since been able to live and work in other EU/EFTA countries[29] under freedom of movement for workers established by the 1957 Treaty of Rome[30] and participated in their first European Parliament elections in 2004.

[34] In response to domestic criticism, the government amended the programme to require an additional €150,000 investment in bonds, stocks, or other approved financial assets held for at least five years.

Applicants were also required to make a real estate purchase valued at least €350,000 or lease a residence with a minimum annual rent of €16,000.

The total number of successful primary applicants would be limited to 1,800 people and the names of every person acquiring citizenship under the programme would be published.

[36] This naturalisation pathway is not directly run by a Maltese government ministry and is instead operated by Henley & Partners, a consultancy firm that assists private clients with immigration and citizenship law.

[37] The European Commission has repeatedly condemned this citizenship pathway for its high risks in aiding money laundering, tax evasion, and corruption.

[38][39][40] Despite requests to cease approving naturalisations by investment, the Maltese government renewed the scheme in 2020 with raised capital requirements after the original programme reached close to its 1,800-person limit.

Though this dropped somewhat lower in the 2000s, the extension of citizenship eligibility to more generations of Maltese born abroad contributed to a further increase in registrations.

Citizenship may be involuntarily removed from naturalised or registered persons who: fraudulently acquired the status, committed an act of disloyalty against the state, aided an enemy nation with which Malta is at war, have been sentenced to incarceration for longer than 12 months within seven years of acquiring citizenship, or permanently reside overseas (other than those employed in the civil service or supranational organisation that Malta is a member state of) for a continuous period of seven years without registering their intention to retain Maltese citizenship.