March 8, 2011 –
FinCEN’s New Chapter X Becomes Effective

Today, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”) announced that it transferred the current Bank Secrecy Act regulations (“BSA Regulations”) to a new chapter in the Code of Federal Regulations (“CFR”) (the “Announcement”).  FinCEN has restructured the BSA Regulations so that they can be readily identified as being specific to a particular regulated industry or as being generally applicable to all regulated industries or covered persons.

The CFR codifies the federal agency rules published in the Federal Register and it is divided into fifty (50) titles representing broad areas of regulation.  As of today, the BSA Regulations will be in a new tenth chapter of Title 31, appearing as “Title 31 Chapter X – Financial Crimes Enforcement Network.”  31 CFR Chapter X is organized by generally applicable regulations and by industry-specific regulations. FinCEN has made no substantive changes made to the underlying BSA Regulations during this transfer and reorganization.

Financial institutions should proceed to modify their BSA manuals to reflect the new BSA Regulations citations and other references.

To read a complete copy of the Announcement on the FinCEN website, click here.