topic Re: Form 8938 in After you file

Form 8938

Anna — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 10:46:52 GMT

For married filing jointly and living in US: if the balance at a foreign bank account at any point during the year did not exceed $150,000.00 (converted from foreign currency per rules) and the balance at the end of the year is $100,000.43 does the Form 8938 need to be filed or is the amount rounded down to $100,000 and falls under the threshold and the form does not need to be filed? Thank you. Anna

Re: Form 8938

Anonymous_ — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 20:02:59 GMT

See https://www.irs.gov/instructions/i8938#en_US_2020_publink55389wd0e790

@pk?

Re: Form 8938

pk — Wed, 18 Jan 2023 00:59:29 GMT

@Anna while I agree with @Anonymous_ that you can choose not to file the form 8938 ,but given (a) dependency on the exchange rate and fluctuations thereof ,(b) your bank would report this anyways ( assuming that most foreign banks are FATCA compliant ), (c) nil tax impact, (d) FBAR reporting anyways and (e) onerous penalties for wilful disregard of requirement to report, I would humbly suggest just spend a few extra minutes of effort an report this -- you are too close for comfort , especially if the bank is from a country IRS wants to pay attention to . It is safer to report and get this over with , please

Re: Form 8938

ShirlynW — Wed, 18 Jan 2023 20:56:37 GMT

IRS Pub 17 page 14 states, you can round off cents to whole dollars on your returns and schedules. If you do round to the whole dollar, you must round all amounts. To round, drop amounts under 50 cents and increase amounts 50 to 99 cents to the next dollar.

Form 8938 is an informational return; I suggest filing one. That way, you will know there will not be a penalty for failure to file.