Henley & Partners scored 199 jurisdictions on their competitiveness for internationally mobile wealth in 2026. Panama scored 71.5 and made the report's Latin America policy spotlight. Here's what that actually measures.
Every year, Henley & Partners tracks where the world's wealthy are physically relocating and why — not opinion, but visa applications, residence filings, and citizenship-by-investment volumes. The 2026 report introduced something new: the Global Wealth Mobility Framework, scoring 199 jurisdictions across 12 weighted dimensions instead of just counting outbound millionaires. Panama scored 71.5 and was one of the LATAM markets the report singled out for a closer look. For a family already thinking about where to hold residence, citizenship, and assets, that's a data point worth understanding — not a marketing headline.
The report's central thesis for 2026 is that wealthy families have stopped rooting themselves in a single jurisdiction. Instead, they're building what Henley calls a sovereign portfolio — combining residence rights, citizenship options, business interests, and assets across several countries to create resilience against any one jurisdiction's policy shifts. It's not about leaving anywhere. It's about optionality: having somewhere else fully set up and ready, whether or not it's ever needed.
The 12 dimensions Henley weighs include tax treatment, rule of law, quality of life, investor and HNWI migration pathways, family inclusion, geopolitical stability, and capital mobility. Panama's case rests on a specific combination that's harder to find as a package elsewhere in the hemisphere:
Foreign-sourced income isn't taxed in Panama — a structural feature, not a temporary incentive program that can be revoked by the next administration.
The balboa is pegged 1:1 to the US dollar and the USD circulates as legal tender. No currency risk, no capital controls on repatriating funds.
The Qualified Investor Visa grants permanent residency — not a temporary phase — for a real estate investment, with no minimum stay requirement to maintain status.
This matters against the backdrop the report describes elsewhere: the UK's non-dom regime abolition, France's near-miss on citizenship-based taxation, Spain ending its Golden Visa while keeping its wealth tax, and Germany's ongoing wealth-tax debate. Families in those positions aren't necessarily leaving — but per Henley's own findings, they're increasingly building a second base as insurance, and that second base needs to be somewhere structurally stable, not just cheap.
The report's point isn't that everyone should move to Panama. It's that policy predictability is now priced into where global wealth chooses to put down roots — and Panama's territorial tax system has stayed the same regardless of who's in office.
For most of our clients, "sovereign portfolio" doesn't mean relocating full-time. It means a residence permit that's active and renewable, a titled real estate asset held through the right structure, and a plan for what happens if their primary jurisdiction changes the rules on them. That's a conversation worth having before it's urgent — not after a tax reform lands in the mail.
If you're evaluating Panama as part of a broader jurisdiction strategy — alongside a foundation or holding structure question, as we cover in S.A. vs Foundation — a country advisory session is the fastest way to get a straight answer on whether it fits your specific situation.