E-1

To qualify for E-1 classification, the treaty trader must:

• Be a national (citizen) of a country with which the United States maintains a treaty of commerce and navigation:
• Carry on substantial trade
• Carry on principal trade between the United States and the treaty country.

Trade is the existing international exchange of items of trade for consideration between the United States and the treaty country.  

Items of trade include but are not limited to: 

Goods, Services, International banking, Insurance, Transportation, Tourism, Technology and its transfer, and some news-gathering activities.

E-2

To qualify for E-2 classification, the treaty investor must: 

• Be a national of a country with which the United States maintains treaty of commerce and navigation
• Have invested, or be actively in the process of investing, a substantial (relative to the enterprise) amount of capital in a bona fide enterprise in the United States
• Be seeking to enter the United States solely to develop and direct the investment enterprise.  This is established by showing at least 50% ownership of the enterprise or possession of operational control through a managerial position or other corporate device.

EB-5

Business investors who invest $1 million or $500,000 (if the investment is made in a targeted employment area) in a new commercial enterprise that employs at least 10 full-time U.S. workers can become conditional residents immediately and permanent residents after two years.

L-1

To qualify for L-1 classification in this category, the employer must:

• Have a qualifying relationship with a foreign company (parent company, branch, subsidiary, or affiliate, collectively referred to as qualifying organizations); and
• Currently be, or will be, doing business as an employer in the United States and in at least one other country directly or through a qualifying organization for the duration of the beneficiary’s stay in the United States as an L-1.  While the business must be viable, there is no requirement that it be engaged in international trade. 

Also to qualify, the named employee must:

• Generally have been working for a qualifying organization abroad for one continuous year within the three years immediately preceding his or her admission to the United States; and
• Be seeking to enter the United States to render services in an executive or managerial capacity to a branch of the same employer or one of its qualifying organizations.

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