FBAR Penalties: Relief for Taxpayers?

January 17, 2019  |  New York Law Journal

By statute, taxpayers who fail to disclose accounts on a Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Account, commonly referred to as an FBAR, are subject to a maximum penalty of up to 50% of the funds in the undisclosed accounts. However, two recent district court opinions have held that the applicable regulations cap the FBAR penalty at $100,000 per undisclosed account. In this article, we analyze four recent cases that have split on the maximum permissible FBAR penalty and the implications of this debate.

FBAR Penalties: Relief for Taxpayers? (pdf | 250.65 KB)