[Federal Register Volume 88, Number 121 (Monday, June 26, 2023)]
[Notices]
[Pages 41402-41403]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2023-13460]


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FEDERAL RESERVE SYSTEM

[Docket No. OP-1788]


Guidelines for Evaluating Account and Services Requests

AGENCY: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. ACTION: 
Notice.

SUMMARY: The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Board) 
is withdrawing proposed amendments to its Guidelines for Evaluating 
Account and Services Requests (Account Access Guidelines) that would 
have required the Federal Reserve Banks (Reserve Banks) to publish a 
periodic list of depository institutions with access to Reserve Bank 
accounts and/or financial services. Because a new section 11C of the 
Federal Reserve Act (the Act) was recently enacted that requires 
disclosures substantially similar to those in the Board's proposal, the 
Board believes finalizing the proposed amendments to its Account Access 
Guidelines is unnecessary.
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    \1\ The reporting period always begins the day after the closing 
date of the last report filed. If the committee is new and has not 
previously filed a report, the first report must cover all activity 
that occurred before the committee registered as a political 
committee up through the close of books for the first report due.
    \2\ Notice that this filing deadline falls on a weekend or 
federal holiday. Filing deadlines are not extended when they fall on 
nonworking days. Accordingly, reports filed on paper by methods 
other than registered, certified or overnight mail must be received 
before the Commission's close of business on the last business day 
before the deadline.

DATES: The Board is withdrawing the proposal published November 16, 
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2022 (87 FR 68691) as of June 16, 2023.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Jason Hinkle, Assistant Director (202-
912-7805), Division of Reserve Bank Operations and Payment Systems; or 
Corinne Milliken Van Ness, Senior Counsel (202-452- 2421) or Gavin 
Smith, Senior Counsel (202-452-3474); for users of TTY-TRS, please call 
711 from any telephone, anywhere in the United States; Board of 
Governors of the Federal Reserve System, 20th and C Streets NW, 
Washington, DC 20551.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

I. Background

A. Board's Proposed Amendments to the Account Access Guidelines

    On November 16, 2022, the Board published proposed amendments to 
its Account Access Guidelines that would have required disclosure of 
institutions with access to Reserve Bank accounts and/or financial 
services (accounts and services).\1\ This information historically

[[Page 41403]]

has not been disclosed publicly. The development and publication of the 
Account Access Guidelines, however, prompted the Board to consider the 
potential benefits of disclosing the names of institutions that have 
access to accounts and services.
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    \1\ See 87 FR 68691.
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    The Board proposed for public comment a requirement for Reserve 
Banks to publish periodically a list of depository institutions with 
access to accounts and services, including whether each depository 
institution with access to accounts and services is federally insured 
and in which Reserve Bank district the depository institution is 
located. In addition, the Board proposed to have the Reserve Banks 
publish a list of depository institutions that have, since the prior 
publication, received access to accounts and services or no longer have 
access to accounts and services.\2\
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    \2\ The Board proposed that the list of depository institutions 
that no longer have access to accounts and/or services would include 
both depository institutions that lost access to accounts and 
services and those that gave up their access to accounts and 
services voluntarily.
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B. Subsequent Amendment to the Federal Reserve Act

    Subsequent to the publication of the proposal, the James M. Inhofe 
National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023 amended the Act 
by adding a new Section 11C. New Section 11C of the Act requires the 
Board, not later than 180 days after December 23, 2022, to create and 
``maintain a public, online and searchable database'' of entities that 
have, or that are requesting, account and service access, along with 
the status of any request for an account and services.\3\ For each 
entity that has, or is requesting access to, accounts and services, new 
Section 11C of the Act also requires the database to indicate if the 
entity is a federally insured bank or credit union or a non-federally 
insured depository institution.
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    \3\ See 12 U.S.C. 248c. The new Section 11C excludes official 
accountholders from the list of entities published on the database 
and defines ``Official accountholders'' as foreign states (as 
defined in section 25B of the Act), central banks (as defined in 
section 25B of the Act) other than a commercial bank, public 
international organizations entitled to enjoy privileged examples 
and immunities as an international organization under the 
International Organizations Immunities Act (22 U.S.C. 288 et seq.), 
and any governmental entity for which the Secretary of Treasury has 
directed a Reserve Bank to receive deposits as fiscal agent of the 
United States under section 15 of the Act.
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II. Notice That the Board Will Not Adopt the Proposed Amendments to the 
Account Access Guidelines

    The Board has determined that the disclosure requirements in the 
Act's new Section 11C substantially supplant the Board's proposal to 
incorporate a disclosure requirement into the Account Access 
Guidelines. Therefore, the Board will not adopt its proposed amendments 
to the Account Access Guidelines.

    By order of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve 
System.
Margaret McCloskey Shanks,
Deputy Secretary of the Board.
[FR Doc. 2023-13460 Filed 6-23-23; 8:45 am]
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