FinCEN and the Federal Reserve Board are withdrawing the October 2020 joint notice of proposed rulemaking that would have cut cross-border Recordkeeping and Travel Rule thresholds from $3,000 to $250 and clarified that “money” in those rules covers convertible virtual currency and legal-tender digital assets. FinCEN’s Federal Register notices listing dated 6 November 2026 announces the withdrawal. The Federal Register public-inspection document 2026-22809, with PDF text, is scheduled for publication on 9 November 2026.
The Agencies’ operative line is unambiguous: “The Agencies will not take further action on this NPRM.” What falls away is a proposal. The existing $3,000 thresholds in the Recordkeeping Rule and Travel Rule remain in place. This is not a new cut to $250, and it is not a freshly minted crypto carve-out.
What the 2020 NPRM would have changed
The joint NPRM published on 27 October 2020 at 85 FR 68005 proposed three linked moves. First, FinCEN and the Board would have reduced the Recordkeeping Rule threshold from $3,000 to $250 for funds transfers and transmittals of funds that begin or end outside the United States. Second, FinCEN would have made the same $250 cut for the Travel Rule’s transmit threshold on those cross-border transfers. Third, the Agencies would have revised the definitions of “payment order” and “transmittal order” so that “money” expressly reached convertible virtual currency and digital assets with legal tender status, for domestic and cross-border transactions alike.
Those rules sit in 31 CFR 1020.410(a) and 1010.410(e) (Recordkeeping) and 31 CFR 1010.410(f) (Travel Rule), with the Board’s Regulation S incorporating the Recordkeeping substance. The withdrawal document restates that background and then cancels the unfinished rulemaking package.
Nearly 3,000 comments, generally opposed to $250
The Agencies say they received nearly 3,000 comments from depository institutions, money services businesses, trade associations, individuals and others. A significant majority of those letters were substantially similar form comments. Commenters generally opposed cutting the international Recordkeeping and Travel Rule thresholds to $250. Many argued the lower trigger would impose heavy burden on smaller institutions, disrupt remittances, multiply the number of covered transfers and expand liability for holding personally identifiable information. Some noted that suspicious activity below $3,000 can already reach FinCEN through Suspicious Activity Reports.
Sentiment on the CVC clarification was mixed. Providers of CVC-related services and related trade associations often opposed that piece; some banks and bank trade associations supported it. The withdrawal does not adopt either camp’s preferred rewrite. It simply stops the 2020 package.
Why the Agencies are walking away now
The public-inspection text gives two primary reasons. More than five years have passed since the NPRM, and the Agencies want fresh public feedback before adopting any similar amendments — withdrawing now, they write, “to provide certainty to the public that no final rule will be issued without an additional opportunity for public comment.” Second, they point to significant recent developments in the CVC industry, including maturing markets and emerging legal frameworks, and say any future Travel Rule or Recordkeeping amendments touching CVC should be considered against that newer landscape so they are “fit for purpose.”
For firms that have been modelling a $250 cross-border collect-and-transmit floor since 2020, the immediate compliance message is status quo: keep collecting, retaining and transmitting at the $3,000 line the current regulations already require. Nothing in the withdrawal creates a temporary $250 duty, and nothing in it writes a permanent CVC exemption into the BSA rules. If the Agencies revisit either the threshold or the money definition, they say that would need a new proposal and a new comment period.
How this sits next to other US crypto-regulation posts
TSN’s recent US regulatory file has been tracking adjacent but different instruments. OIRA has opened EO 12866 review of the SEC’s crypto broker-dealer financial-responsibility proposal (RIN 3235-AN48) — a securities rulemaking still pending White House review, not a BSA threshold change. On the banking side, the OCC has finalised its GENIUS Act stablecoin rule while flagging that AML rules are still to come. Separately, FinCEN’s enforcement posture remains live in older TSN coverage such as the Bank of America BSA penalty that credited a record OCC assessment.
Those posts do not decide Travel Rule thresholds. They do show the same pattern readers should apply here: attribute the instrument, name the stage, and refuse to treat a withdrawn proposal as operative law. A FinCEN–Fed withdrawal of an NPRM is the opposite of a final rulemaking — it is the Agencies telling the market the 2020 draft will not be finished as proposed.
What withdrawal does not rewrite
Two misreadings are worth shutting down early. First, withdrawing the $250 idea does not raise or lower the live threshold; $3,000 was the law before 27 October 2020 and remains the law after this withdrawal. Second, because the CVC clarification never became a final definitional amendment, its disappearance with the NPRM does not invent a special crypto safe harbour. How Travel Rule obligations apply to particular CVC or legal-tender digital-asset flows continues to turn on the existing regulations and any other authorities that already apply — not on a 2020 proposal that the Agencies have now abandoned.
UK and other non-US readers should read this as a US Bank Secrecy Act process update. It does not amend the UK Money Laundering Regulations, the FCA’s cryptoasset regime or the FATF recommendation text. Cross-border firms still face the Travel Rule frameworks of each jurisdiction they touch; only the unfinished US $250 NPRM is gone.
What to watch next
Three public breadcrumbs would reopen the file: a new FinCEN or joint FinCEN–Board NPRM on Recordkeeping or Travel Rule thresholds; a separate proposal that re-opens the definition of “money” for CVC and legal-tender digital assets; or guidance that restates how the existing $3,000 rules apply without changing the number. Until one of those appears, the dual primary record for 6–9 November 2026 is the withdrawal itself — nearly 3,000 comments later, the Agencies will not take further action on 85 FR 68005, and the $3,000 cross-border floor stays.
Sources
Primary:
- FinCEN: Federal Register Notices — Withdrawal of Proposed Rule Related to Recordkeeping and Travel Rule Obligations (listing dated 11/06/2026)
- Federal Register public inspection 2026-22809 (scheduled publication 9 Nov 2026)
- Public-inspection PDF 2026-22809
Related TSN:
- OIRA Begins Review of SEC Crypto Broker-Dealer Rules
- OCC Finalises GENIUS Act Stablecoin Rule, With AML Rules Still to Come
- US Treasury Fines Bank of America $1.2 Billion Over Money Laundering Failures
Related stories
- OIRA Begins Review of SEC Crypto Broker-Dealer Rules
- US Treasury Fines Bank of America $1.2 Billion Over Money Laundering Failures, Crediting a Record $750 Million OCC Penalty
- OCC Finalises GENIUS Act Stablecoin Rule, With AML Rules Still to Come
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