On November 18th, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) published updated data for Q4 (July-September) pertaining to the number of I-526 petitions (Immigrant Petition by Alien Entrepreneur) and I-829 petitions (Petition by Entrepreneur to Remove Conditions) received, approved, denied and pending as of September 30, 2015.
IIUSA has put together data reports for I-526 petitions (click here), I-829 petitions (click here) and petition processing times (click here). Highlights and trend analysis are listed below.
I-526 Data Highlights:
- USCIS received 6,500+ I-526 petitions in Q4 which was almost equal to the combined number of petitions received for the first three quarters of the fiscal year.
- I-526 approvals dropped in Q4 by 25% to 2,185 which can likely be attributed to the large increase in receipts and longer processing times.
- The Q4 I-526 approval rate declined to 85% which was the lowest quarter of FY2015.
- FY2015 saw a large increase in the number of total filings with over 14,000 receipts.
- In total there were 17,367 petitions pending with USCIS as of 9/30, representing approximately $8.7 billion in foreign direct investment into the U.S.
- For FY2015 EB-5 accounted for $4.378 billion in FDI representing a 71% increase year over year
- Processing times for Q4 increased to 14.4 months, up from 13.8 months in Q3.
To view the full I-526 data report Click Here
I-829 Data Highlights:
- In Q4 USCIS received only 499 I-829 petitions which represents a 35% decrease from Q3 and a 49% decrease year-over-year
- 461 I-829’s were approved in Q4 a 72% increase in approvals from Q3 which had previously been the most productive quarter of the year.
- There are currently 4,049 pending approvals pending which is a slight increase from the Q3 total of 4,007.
- Processing times for I-829’s increased slightly from 15.4 months in Q3 to 15.5 months in Q4.
To view the full I-829 data report Click Here
Petition Processing Times:
I-526 Petitions
- As of 9/30/15, processing times adjusted to 14.4 months a significant slowdown from the 13.8 months figure from 8/31/15. The slowdown can be attributed to I-526 petitions riling rush prior the fiscal year deadline brought on by the EB-5 Regional Center Program “sunset date” of September 30, 2015.
I-829 Petitions
- Processing times for I-829 petitions decrease slightly from 15.5 months on 8/31/15 to 15.4 months on 9/30/15.
I-924 Applications
- Processing times for I-924 applications decrease from 12.3 months on 8/31/15 to 11.6 months on 9/30/15.
To view the full report on Processing times Click Here.
