Alexandru Bittner, a U.S. citizen born in Romania, moved to the U.S. as a kid, then went back to Romania in the 1990s to run a business. The whole time, he had no idea he was supposed to file an FBAR (Report of Foreign Bank Accounts) every year. Once he found out, he filed five years’ worth at once. That’s when things got messy. The IRS counted every account he’d held over those five years and tried to fine him for each one. 272 accounts, times the maximum $10,000 penalty per account, came out to almost $2.7 million.

Bittner fought back, and the case landed at the Supreme Court in 2023. The question was simple: does the $10,000 cap on non-willful FBAR penalties (now $16,536, adjusted for inflation) apply per account, or per report (per year)? Per account means the fine explodes the more accounts you have. Per report means you get fined once a year, no matter how many accounts you’re juggling.

The Supreme Court sided with Bittner, 5-4. Justice Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion (joined by Roberts, Alito, Kavanaugh in part, and Jackson). Justice Barrett wrote the dissent (joined by Thomas, Sotomayor, and Kagan). That’s not your usual conservative-liberal lineup, which is part of why this case got so much attention. Barrett argued in her dissent that “the most natural reading of the statute” pointed to per-account penalties. The majority didn’t buy it.

The numbers show why this mattered so much. For someone like Bittner, with multiple accounts over five years:

• Per account (the IRS’s argument): 5 years × number of accounts × $10,000 max = up to $2.7 million
• Per year (the Court’s ruling): 5 years × $10,000 max = up to $50,000

Same violation, same person. Just changing how you count the penalty swung the number by more than 50x.

One thing worth underlining: this change only applies to non-willful violations. If the IRS decides you hid your accounts on purpose, the penalty is still calculated per account, and it’s much steeper. The gap between “I didn’t know” and “I knew and didn’t file” only got wider after this ruling.

If you’re a U.S. citizen or green card holder with multiple accounts overseas (checking, brokerage, pension-type accounts, whatever), and you’re just now realizing you should’ve been filing FBARs, the math is a little less scary than it used to be. That said, this ruling doesn’t mean you’re off the hook. You still have to file. And if you can show your non-filing was genuinely non-willful, there’s a separate path (the Streamlined Filing Compliance Procedures) that can clear things up with no penalty at all. Exactly how much you’d owe depends on your account count, timeline, and whether the IRS sees it as willful. So instead of running the numbers yourself, talk to a professional first.