The Corporate Transparency Act

In January of 2021, Congress passed the Corporate Transparency Act (‘CTA’), which requires many corporations, limited liability companies, and other entities created in or registered to do business in the United States to report information about their beneficial owners—the persons who ultimately own or control the company—to the Financial Crimes Information Network (‘FinCEN’). The purpose? To prevent the illicit use of the corporate form to shield money launderers, drug traffickers, terrorists, and other bad actors. Pursuant to FinCEN implementing regulations, the Act now requires newly formed qualifying entities to report their beneficial ownership, and existing entities to evaluate whether they qualify and if so, prepare to file in January of 2025. This CLE will review the CTA and provide a primer on what constitutes a ‘reporting company’ under the Act for purposes of triggering reporting requirements. It will then discuss the requirements for identifying beneficial owners, note compliance dates, and summarize the information that must be reported. Along the way, attendees will also learn about resources supporting relevant workflow. Attendees will obtain an introduction to the key requirements of the Corporate Transparency Act, including: • How to identify whether an entity qualifies as a ‘reporting company’ and thereby must report beneficial ownership information; • How to evaluate which individuals qualify as beneficial owners of a reporting company; • What information must be included in the report, and key effective dates and filing deadlines; and • Penalties for non-compliance Moreover, attendees will also learn best practices for learning more on specific CTA-related topics through available research resources.