Tax and residency

FBAR

Also called FinCEN Form 114, Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts, foreign bank account report.

The FBAR is FinCEN Form 114, the annual report of foreign financial accounts that every US person, which a green card makes you, must file when those accounts together exceeded $10,000 at any moment in the calendar year. It goes to FinCEN through the BSA E-Filing System, not to the IRS with the tax return.

What it decides

31 CFR 1010.350 puts the duty on each United States person holding a financial interest in, or signature or other authority over, a foreign account, and it defines that person to include a resident alien under 26 U.S.C. 7701(b), which a green card holder is from the first day of residence. The $10,000 figure is not in that section: 31 CFR 1010.306(c) carries it, measured on the aggregate of every account at any moment in the year rather than account by account. That same paragraph still prints 30 June, which is obsolete, because Public Law 114-41 section 2006(b)(11) moved the due date to 15 April with a six month extension ending 15 October, and FinCEN grants that extension without a request. Under 31 U.S.C. 5321(a)(5) the non-willful ceiling is $10,000, with a reasonable cause exception, and the willful penalty is the greater of $100,000 or half the account balance at the time of the violation, adjusted for inflation by 31 CFR 1010.821 to $16,536 and $165,353 for penalties assessed on or after 17 January 2025. Bittner held the non-willful penalty accrues per report, not per account.

Governed by 31 CFR 1010.350 for who files and for the definition of United States person; 31 CFR 1010.306(c) for the $10,000 threshold and for the superseded 30 June date; Public Law 114-41 section 2006(b)(11), 129 Stat. 458, for the 15 April due date and the six month extension; 31 U.S.C. 5321(a)(5) for the penalty structure and 31 CFR 1010.821 Table 1 for the inflation adjusted amounts; Bittner v. United States, No. 21-1195, decided 28 February 2023. The IRS page Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts (FBAR), last updated 30 July 2026, carries the threshold and the automatic extension as administered; the regulation alone would mislead on the deadline.

Where this is explained properly

Pages here that go into fbar rather than mentioning it.

Related terms

FATCA and Form 8938Form 8938 is the FATCA report of specified foreign financial assets, attached to the income tax return under 26 U.S.C. 6038D, and it is additional to the FBAR rather than a substitute for it. The same Act makes foreign banks report their US account holders to the IRS, which is how the two sides get matched.
Nonresident alien and resident alienResident alien and nonresident alien are the two United States income tax statuses a non-citizen can hold: a resident alien is taxed on worldwide income and files Form 1040, while a nonresident alien files Form 1040-NR and is taxed only on income effectively connected with a United States business and on United States source passive income.
Residency starting dateThe residency starting date is the day a foreign national becomes a United States resident for income tax purposes, so that worldwide income is taxed from that day on: the first day of presence as a lawful permanent resident under the green card test, the first day of presence in the year under the substantial presence test, or the earlier of the two where both tests are met.
Worldwide incomeWorldwide income is the rule that a United States resident for tax purposes, including a green card holder whose residence is still conditional, is taxed on income from every source anywhere in the world and not only on income arising inside the United States.

Checked against primary sources on 10 August 2026. Back to the glossary