All over the business world, accountants, lawyers, financial executives and journalists are scrambling to keep up with the latest soap opera in the financial community: what’s happening with the Corporate Transparency Act and its ownership reporting rules.
Here’s where we are: In brief, the much-debated CTA imposed heavy reporting requirements on a wide range of companies, starting in 2025. The businesses had to report beneficial ownership information to the Financial Crimes Reporting Network. But on December 3, a federal court issued an injunction against the law. The reporting requirement was put on hold.
However, in a new twist, the CTA is back in action. As the AICPA said on its website: “On Dec. 23, 2024, the Fifth Circuit Court lifted the injunction, allowing FinCEN to enforce BOI reporting.”
So what has changed?
Everything is back to the way it was before the federal court put the law on hold—almost. Understanding that it may be hard for affected businesses to meet the original deadlines in the wake of a three-week suspension, FinCEN has postponed the filing deadlines. As it says on its website:
Reporting companies that were created or registered prior to January 1, 2024 have until January 13, 2025 to file their initial beneficial ownership information reports with FinCEN. (These companies would otherwise have been required to report by January 1, 2025.)
There are other due dates for other companies, and FinCEN has listed all these deadlines online.
This is not necessarily the last word. It’s possible there will be additional court actions, or that the CTA will be modified or even repealed. But that’s in the future. For now, January 13 is coming up quickly, and companies should make sure they’re on-track to meet the FinCEN requirements.
Updates are also available on the AICPA’s BOI information page.
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