On December 23, 2020, the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) published in the Federal Register a notice of proposed rulemaking to seek public comments on a proposal to require banks and money service businesses (MSBs) to submit reports, keep records, and verify the identity of customers in relation to transactions involving convertible virtual currency (CVC) or digital assets with legal tender status (“legal tender digital assets” or LTDA) held in unhosted wallets (as defined in the notice), or held in wallets hosted in a jurisdiction identified by FinCEN. FinCEN is proposing to adopt these requirements pursuant to the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA). To effectuate certain of these proposed requirements, FinCEN proposes to prescribe by regulation that CVC and LTDA are “monetary instruments” for purposes of the BSA. However, FinCEN is not proposing to modify the regulatory definition of “monetary instruments” or otherwise alter existing BSA regulatory requirements applicable to “monetary instruments” in FinCEN’s regulations, including the existing currency transaction reporting (CTR) requirement and the existing transportation of currency or monetary instruments reporting requirement. Written comments on this proposed rule may be submitted on or before January 4, 2021.
