A working group composed of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the National Credit Union Administration, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the US Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network issued a joint statement on July 22 that is intended to provide greater clarity regarding the risk-focused approach used by examiners for planning and performing Bank Secrecy Act (BSA)/anti-money laundering (AML) examinations.
The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) recently issued guidance consolidating current FinCEN regulations, rulings, and guidance about cryptocurrencies and money services businesses (MSBs) under the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA). Along with the May 9 guidance, FinCEN issued an advisory to assist financial institutions in identifying and reporting suspicious activity or criminal use of cryptocurrencies.
As National Cybersecurity Awareness Month comes to a close, the federal financial regulators have been releasing guidance related to cybersecurity and financial technology (FinTech) issues faster than a teen can complain about slow Wi-Fi.
In the last 10 days, there have been a number of notable releases:
- The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Federal Reserve Board), the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) released a joint advance notice of proposed rulemaking titled Enhanced Cyber Risk Management Standards that would apply to large supervised financial institutions and their service providers.
- The Federal Reserve Board’s Secure Payments Task Force identified its key priorities for addressing secure payments: payment identity management, information sharing to mitigate payments risk and fraud, and data protection. The task force has invited industry feedback on these priorities through November 8.
Starting August 1, violations of financial regulations will come with higher civil money penalties (CMPs). The CMP increases are in response to the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Improvements Act of 2015 (the Act). The Act requires Executive Branch and independent agencies (Agencies) to make annual adjustments for inflation to CMP dollar amounts, as well as an initial “catch-up” adjustment based on a formula set forth in the Act. Although the Act was part of the contentious budget bill that was passed on October 30, 2015 (and that avoided a government shutdown), the Act did not receive much independent coverage, and the increases may be unexpected to businesses that are potentially subject to the increased penalties.
The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), the bureau of the US Department of the Treasury responsible for oversight and enforcement of the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA), has issued an interim final rule (Rule) that significantly increases the statutory penalties for various violations of the BSA and its applicable regulations. Prior to the Rule, FinCEN had not increased its civil money penalty (CMP) amounts for more than a decade, and in some cases, for several decades.
The increases are being issued in response to the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Improvements Act of 2015 (the Act). The Act requires Executive Branch and independent agencies to make annual adjustments for inflation to CMP dollar amounts, as well as an initial “catch-up” adjustment based on a formula set forth in the Act. Although the Act was part of the contentious budget bill that was passed in the early morning of October 30, 2015, and avoided a government shutdown, the Act did not receive much independent coverage, and the increases may be unexpected to some businesses subject to the BSA.
Yet another attempt has failed to pass legislation shielding banks that provide services to marijuana-related businesses from regulatory action or other penalties. Late last week, the US House of Representatives appeared likely to approve an amendment to the House Financial Services and General Government appropriations bill (the Amendment) that would prevent financial institutions from being penalized if they provided services to state-sanctioned marijuana-related businesses. A similar amendment had already been approved by the Senate Appropriations Committee and appeared likely to be approved by the US Senate.
