All over the business world, accountants, lawyers, financial executives, and journalists are trying to keep up with the latest situation with the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) and its ownership reporting rules.
The much-debated CTA requires businesses to report beneficial ownership information (BOI) to the Financial Crimes Reporting Network (FinCEN).
However, on December 3, a federal court issued an injunction against the law, and the reporting requirement was put on hold.
On December 23, 2024, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals lifted the injunction, allowing FinCEN to enforce BOI reporting.
Almost everything is back to the way it was before the federal court put the law on hold. 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.
An update on FinCEN’s website states: 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 It is possible there will be additional court actions, or that the CTA will be modified or even repealed. For now, January 13, 2025 is quickly approaching, and companies should contact their legal advisors to make sure they are on-track to meet the FinCEN requirements.