Turkish Citizenship by Private Pension Investment

Av. Serkan KARA, Serka Law Firm (Istanbul Bar, no. 53770)

Last reviewed: 20 October 2026 · Reviewed by Av. Serkan Kara

Turkish citizenship through the private pension system requires contributions of at least USD 500,000, or its equivalent in foreign currency, sold to a bank in Türkiye and by that bank to the Central Bank, with the lira from that sale paid into a pension contract and kept in the system for three years in funds whose scope the Insurance and Private Pension Regulation and Supervision Agency (SEDDK) sets (Article 20(2)(f) and 20(10) of the Regulation on the Implementation of the Turkish Citizenship Law). SEDDK determines the investment and sends the conformity letter, on the file a pension company builds and the pension monitoring centre checks. What decides the file is written in SEDDK’s Circular on the private pension system of 28 January 2026: one new contract in a plan that carries the word “citizenship”, the whole amount in that one contract, and three years in which the plan cannot be changed or moved.

Serka Law Firm runs pension-route files from the company’s offer and the undertaking to the passport, as part of the work set out on our Turkish citizenship by investment lawyer page.

One contract, one company, three years

The investor joins the system through a pension company operating in Türkiye, in a new contract within a plan whose title carries the word “vatandaşlık”, a word the Circular reserves to these plans alone (Section K, Article 1(1)). These plans take no entry fee and no management fee deduction, and they may not include any fund whose title carries “foreign” (yabancı) or “external debt instruments” (dış borçlanma araçları) (Article 1(2)). For the first three years the plan cannot be changed, the account cannot be merged with another on retirement and the savings cannot be moved to another company, and the company must tell the investor so at the offer stage (Article 1(3) and 1(4)). The amount that qualifies may not be split across more than one contract (Article 1(8)), and a contract within the citizenship plan cannot be assigned to a lender as a receivable (Section E, Article 4(1)).

At the offer the company takes the governorate where the investor will apply for his residence permit, a copy of his passport and his undertaking to stay three years in the system, written in two languages, one of them Turkish (Article 1(5)), and it names the contracted bank to which the contribution is paid (Article 1(7)). Before the transaction the company or the bank tells the investor in writing, and he signs, that once the Central Bank has bought the currency the sale cannot be abandoned or cancelled for any reason (Article 1(6)).

When the three years begin, and what ends them

The contract enters into force, and the three years begin, when the lira from the sale to the Central Bank reaches the company’s account in cash (SEDDK’s explanation; Section K, Article 2(4)). Within five working days of that date the company sends the pension monitoring centre (Emeklilik Gözetim Merkezi, EGM) the identity documents, the proof that the currency was deposited or transferred, the proof of its sale to the Central Bank, the receipt of the lira paid as contribution, the contract’s number and date, the governorate and the undertaking, each checked and approved by two of the company’s managers. EGM checks the file within five working days and passes complete files to SEDDK, which sends the conformity letter to the company for the investor and to the Directorate General of Civil Registration and Citizenship Affairs, the Presidency of Migration Management and the governorate (Article 2(1) to 2(3)).

For three years EGM checks the conditions regularly. A breach of any of them, a plan change, a merger, a transfer to another company, is reported within two working days to SEDDK, the Directorate General, the Presidency of Migration Management and the governorate; at the end of the three years EGM tells the same authorities that the conditions were met (Article 2(5)). Two things do not end the file. A fall of the savings below USD 500,000 because the exchange rate has moved affects neither the application nor the citizenship (SEDDK’s explanation). And the investor who began on another route may continue on this one: he gives the company the earlier conformity letters and proof of the money’s trail, and pays as contribution the lira equivalent of the required amount at the Central Bank’s buying rate of the day he moves (Section K, Article 3).

The state contribution, and what comes after

The state contribution that the private pension system pays on a member’s contributions is calculated, for these investors, only on contributions paid after the citizenship is acquired (SEDDK’s explanation). SEDDK applies the same investment to the investor’s short-term residence permit under Article 31(1)(j) of Law No. 6458 and to a long-term residence permit under Article 43(2), on the Migration Policies Board’s decision 2017/02. The Directorate General of Civil Registration and Citizenship Affairs names four steps the investor takes in person: obtaining the Certificate of Conformity, applying for the short-term residence permit, collecting the residence card and applying for citizenship. Leaving the system after the three years, and the tax withheld on the return, are governed by the pension law and the income tax law, and they are read for the investor’s own plan and company before the contract is signed.

The currency: what is sold, and what cannot be undone

The Central Bank buys only US dollars, euros, pounds sterling and Swiss francs; a transfer in any other foreign currency is converted by the Turkish bank into one of them and then sold on (Article 5(2) of its Implementation Instruction of 16 May 2022). A transfer in Turkish lira leaves nothing to sell. Once the Central Bank has completed its purchase the sale cannot be abandoned or cancelled (Article 7), which the investor signs before the transaction on this route.

The pension, fund units, government bonds or a bank deposit

All four take USD 500,000 sold to the Central Bank and three years. On the bank deposit route the three years are held in a lira balance, on the government bond route in lira government debt instruments, on the fund route in units of a real estate or venture capital fund. On the pension route they are held in a pension contract whose plan, company and amount are fixed for the three years, with no entry fee and no management fee deduction, and whose exit afterwards follows the pension system’s own rules.

Before the contract is signed

The pension route is decided by the papers the investor signs at the offer: the contract and its plan, the funds the citizenship plan offers, the undertaking, and the signed notice that the currency sale cannot be undone.

The texts this page rests on

• Regulation on the Implementation of the Turkish Citizenship Law, Article 20, consolidated text
• SEDDK, Circular on the Private Pension System, 28 January 2026, No. 1, Section K and Section E, Article 4
• SEDDK, explanation for foreigners applying for citizenship or a long-term residence permit through the private pension system
• Central Bank of the Republic of Türkiye, Implementation Instruction of 16 May 2022

This article provides general information on Turkish law and is not legal advice. No attorney-client relationship is formed by reading it; such a relationship arises only through a signed engagement with Serka Law Firm.