The Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) has been a moving target since its implementation was first announced. After months of uncertainty and legal challenges, the U.S. Department of the Treasury issued a press release on March 2, 2025, effectively halting CTA enforcement for U.S. citizens, domestic reporting companies, and their beneficial owners. This means that for now, there will be no penalties, fines, or looming deadlines for businesses that were previously required to report their beneficial ownership information (BOI) to FinCEN.
This announcement comes after a federal court ruling in the Eastern District of Texas last month, which appeared to clear the way for CTA enforcement beginning in March 2025. However, with the Treasury Department’s latest decision, the CTA is effectively in limbo for most U.S.-based entities. Furthermore, the Treasury also announced that it will develop a new rule narrowing the CTA’s scope to apply only to foreign reporting companies. It remains unclear whether U.S. companies with foreign beneficial owners will still be required to report, but for now, enforcement is off the table.
It is important to note that this decision does not repeal the CTA entirely. Only Congress has the power to do that. Additionally, this non-enforcement policy could be subject to legal challenges, as the CTA does not distinguish between U.S. and foreign businesses in its original form. Even if this policy stands throughout the current administration, a future administration could easily reverse course and reinstate the CTA’s enforcement provisions.
Another lingering question is how FinCEN will handle the BOI that has already been reported. FinCEN has spent the last year encouraging businesses to voluntarily submit their information and has maintained a reporting system for this purpose. While BOI submitted to FinCEN is exempt from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, the information remains available to law enforcement, national security agencies, and even foreign governments as originally outlined under the CTA. There is currently no mechanism to remove or “claw back” information that has already been submitted.
What This Means for HOAs, Condos, and Other Reporting Entities
Since this back-and-forth began, our advice to clients has remained the same: do not panic, and let the dust settle. Many of our HOA and condominium clients received solicitations from third party processing companies offering to submit the filings on their behalf for a fee. We were also asked by many of these same clients if they could pay us instead to file them. We advised our clients against paying for unnecessary services while the legal landscape was still murky.
We consistently declined to file reports on behalf of our clients because, frankly, we were not comfortable charging for a service in which we had no special legal training—especially when the federal government had not provided clear, final guidance. Instead, we recommended a wait-and-see approach, staying informed, monitoring deadlines, and being prepared to file if necessary.
Now, it appears that our cautious approach has paid off. Based on this latest announcement, HOAs, condominium associations, and most domestic businesses will not have to file under the CTA after all. Of course, we will continue monitoring any developments, but for now, this chapter of the CTA saga seems to be coming to a close.
