FinCEN Director Gacki Highlights Efforts to Implement Beneficial Ownership Reporting Requirements

FinCEN Director Andrea Gacki reviewed the agency's efforts to implement beneficial ownership information reporting requirements under the Corporate Transparency Act.

In her remarks before the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists (ACAM) Assembly, Ms. Gacki emphasized FinCEN's focus on implementing the beneficial ownership requirements intended to prevent illicit activities facilitated by "opaque" corporate structures. She said that FinCEN has been working on creating a framework to help small businesses file their beneficial ownership information by (i) publishing a Small Entity Compliance Guide, (ii) creating a beneficial ownership information webpage and (iii) issuing a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that would extend the reporting deadline for certain companies. She assured reporting companies that their "sensitive information will be protected in a secure, confidential database built to meet the Federal government's highest security standards and that only authorized users can access the information for authorized purposes—to protect national security and to fight crime."

Further, Ms. Gacki stated that FinCEN will be issuing a rulemaking proposal based on information from a 2021 ANPR "to address the vulnerability in the U.S. real estate market to money laundering and other illicit activity." She said that FinCEN is developing solutions to increase transparency in the domestic real estate market regarding transactions "conducted through opaque shell companies."

Ms. Gacki also highlighted (i) gaps in the U.S. AML/CFT regime, (particularly as to investment advisers "not generally subject to comprehensive AML/CFT requirements under the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) and the PATRIOT Act"), (ii) international efforts to work with Mexico and Canada on the trafficking of fentanyl and (iii) the agency's intention to issue a rulemaking for FinCEN's newly established AML and sanctions whistleblower program.