2024-18034. Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Renewal; Comment Request; Renewal Without Change of Anti-Money Laundering Program Requirements for Casinos

Table 1—Distribution of Casinos Covered by This Notice, by Type of Casino

Type of casino	Number of casinos
Casino	486
Tribal casino	525
Card club	266
Total number of casinos	a  1,277
a  Estimate based on the American Gaming Association (AGA) “State of Play,” reporting 486 commercial casinos and 525 Tribal casinos as of December 31, 2023 (available at https://www.americangaming.org/​state-of-play/​, accessed February 28, 2024). As of December 31, 2022, there were also 266 card rooms as published in the AGA's “State of the States” annual report, p. 16 (available at https://www.americangaming.org/​wpcontent/​uploads/​2023/​05/​AGA-State-of-the-States-2023.pdf, accessed February 28, 2024).

As noted above, 31 U.S.C. 5318(h) mandates that financial institutions establish AML/CFT programs to guard against money laundering and the financing of terrorism. Such programs must include, at a minimum: (a) the development of internal policies, procedures, and controls; (b) the designation of a compliance officer; (c) an ongoing employee training program; and (d) an independent audit function to test programs.^[15]

The AML program regulations for casinos require casinos to implement AML programs that are reasonably designed.^[16] The AML program must be in writing and must be independently tested for compliance with a scope and frequency commensurate with the money laundering and terrorist financing risks posed by the products and services provided by the casino.^[17]

In connection with a variety of initiatives FinCEN is undertaking to implement the AML Act, FinCEN intends to conduct, in the future, additional assessments of the PRA burden associated with BSA requirements.

Part 2. Annual PRA Burden and Cost

For purposes of estimating casino and card rooms' AML program annual PRA burden(s), FinCEN continues to view the recordkeeping burden associated with AML program requirements as the sum of four discrete activities. The scope of the annual PRA burden and cost estimates of the casino AML program requirements in this renewal therefore remains subdivided as follows: maintaining and updating the AML program documentation (Activity A); storing the written AML program (Activity B); ^[18] producing a copy of the written AML program if requested by regulatory examiners or law enforcement (Activity C); and complying with the requirements in 31 CFR 1021.210(b)(2)(v) and (vi), which are unique to casino AML program regulations (Activity D).^[19]

For purposes of estimating the casino AML program annual PRA burden, FinCEN continues to estimate the hourly burden per activity using the same burden estimates that were used in the 2020 notice to renew the OMB control number for the casino AML program requirements.^[20]

• Activity A—FinCEN continues to estimate the incremental annual PRA burden of maintaining and updating a written AML program at an average of one hour per casino, consistent with the burden estimate in the 2020 renewal of this OMB control number and in the renewal of the AML program requirements for other types of financial institutions in 2024.^[21]

• Activity B—Required written AML programs are stored as electronic files. The estimated annual burden (five minutes per financial institution) represents the administrative burden involved in processing the storage of the written program. FinCEN continues to estimate the incremental annual PRA burden of storing an AML program at an average of five minutes per casino.
• Activity C—Producing the written AML program to regulatory or law enforcement agencies, upon their request, is performed electronically. Historically, FinCEN has estimated the annual burden of producing the written program at an average of five minutes per financial institution. This estimated annual burden represents the administrative burden involved in producing the program upon request once per year. FinCEN continues to estimate the incremental annual PRA burden of producing an AML program at five minutes per casino.
• Activity D—In the 2020 renewal of the casino AML program regulations, FinCEN estimated the annual PRA burden to comply with31 CFR 1021.210(b)(2)(v) and (vi) would average approximately 99 hours per casino. FinCEN continues to estimate that the annual incremental PRA burden of complying with these requirements is 99 hours per casino.^[22]

Under these assumptions, FinCEN's estimate of the annual incremental PRA burden is 127,912 hours, as detailed in table 2 below.

Table 2—Distribution of the Estimated Total Annual Burden Hours per Requirement

Required activities	Instances per year	Time per instance	Number of casinos	Total hourly burden
A. Maintaining and updating the written AML program	1 per casino	1 hour	1,277	1,277
B. Storing the written AML program	1 per casino	5 minutes	1,277	* 106
C. Producing the AML program upon request	1 per casino	5 minutes	1,277	* 106
( print page 65980)
D. Ongoing compliance with the requirements in 31 CFR 1021.210(b)(2)(v) and (vi)	1 per casino	99 hours	1,277	126,423
Total hourly burden				127,912
* 106.41 rounded to 106.

FinCEN is utilizing the same fully-loaded composite hourly wage rate of $106.30 utilized in the 2024 NPRMs entitled Customer Identification Programs for Registered Investment Advisers and Exempt Reporting Companies and Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Programs, as well as in recent 60-Day Notices to renew OMB control numbers corresponding to specific BSA regulations.^[23]

The total estimated cost of the annual PRA burden is $13,597,045.60, as reflected in table 3 below:

Table 3—Estimated Total Cost of Annual PRA Burden

Required activities	Burden hours	Wage rate	Total cost
A. Maintaining and updating the written AML program	1,277	$106.30	$135,745.10
B. Storing the written AML program	106	106.30	11,267.80
C. Producing the AML program upon request	106	106.30	11,267.80
D. Ongoing compliance with the requirements in 31 CFR 1021.210(b)(2)(v) and (vi)	126,423	106.30	13,438,764.90
Total cost			13,597,045.60