The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Ends Beneficial Ownership Reporting

            In 2021, at the request of the Biden administration, Congress enacted the Corporate Transparency Act (“CTA”) which required certain businesses to disclose their beneficial owners. The CTA was intended to protect against money laundering, terrorist financing, tax fraud and other illegal acts. However, the CTA effectively applied only to small “mom and pop” businesses. An uproar led to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”) issuing an interim final rule on March 21, 2025, that eliminated the need for U.S. companies to report beneficial ownership information to FinCen under the CTA.

            On August 11, 2026, FinCen announced it is issuing a final rule that permanently ends the requirement for U.S. companies and U.S. persons to report beneficial ownership information to FinCen under the CTA and that it will delete the information previously reported by U.S. persons from the Beneficial Ownership Information database. The final rule will be effective on its publication in the Federal Register which is expected to occur on August 14, 2026.

In addition, the final rule will:

• exempt U.S. persons who have obtained FinCEN IDs from any obligation to update or correct the information they originally provided to FinCEN to obtain their FinCEN IDs;

• adopt the exemptions set out in the interim final rule issued in March 2025, making the rollback of beneficial ownership reporting by U.S. companies permanent;

• eliminate the requirement for foreign companies to report U.S. person “company applicants” (i.e., the individuals who helped those foreign companies register to do business in the United States);

• exempt foreign pooled investment vehicles registered in the United States from reporting the beneficial ownership information of a U.S person in control of the investment vehicle;

Click this link to view the final rule: https://www.federalregister.gov/public-inspection/2026-16576/beneficial-ownership-information-reporting-requirement-revision