To whom do you declare you are taking more than US$10,000 out of the US?

The place at LAX is a temporary-looking room downstairs in the TBIT, just where you'd come out of customs. The booth upstairs (where the police officer directed me) is closed. The customs officer started off very cold and administrative, but I think he was unfamiliar with the process? (not sure), went to another desk and picked up the phone to talk to someone, and when he was done, with a smile, wished me a good trip. Coming into Argentina, due to airport congestion, I came into the "other" terminal, which is not equipped for this, but I asked the customs officer where I declare $. She checked, and then escorted me over to the other terminal, where I did the paperwork. All in all, about 15 to 30 minutes on departure (including finding the place) and maybe 30+ on the return. They even let me use their phone to call the person who was meeting me, due to the terminal change.

And that is the story. Well, not completely, because I'm coming home with what I left with, which is good and bad.

There is so much incorrect infomation in this thread I do not know where to begin. I will address a few problems.

1.. IF you are carrying in excess of $10k into or out of the U.S.A and follow all the "rules" as stated in the U.S Title Codes etc.. You are legal. No grey area.

2.. IF you are not carrying in excess of $10k into or out of the U.S.A, then you don't have to do anything. No grey area.

3.. IF you are travelling domestically and are or are not carrying in excess of $10k then you do not have to do anything and are legal. No grey area.

4.. It is based on per person and not family or friends or whatever as far as the amount. Each person is a single entity for which the $10k rules apply. No grey area.

5.. All of this crap about multiple trips which add up to more than $10k or whatever is incorrect. I can make 1,000,000 trips a day into or out of the U.S.A and have $9,999 each time with no problems and fill out no paperwork. No grey area.

6.. I travel a lot because I am a Professional Poker Player and always have more than $10k in cash and not 1 time in any country on the planet have I had a problem. While travelling all over the planet I have never been asked anything except how much I had and what I did for a living. The most currency in $100 bills I have travelled with at any time was 4.408 pounds.

I am tired so that's it for now. Later.

So I don't see an answer to one of the original questions.
You are returning to the States and you have checked off that you have more than $10000 on your customs form. You have the form FinCEN 105 in your pocket.
You give the customs form to customs; they see that the box is checked "yes". Then what happens? Do the customs people ask for you to give them the form? And what kind of questions do they ask? Do they hassle you?

Thanks

There's no grey area here, all right. That's a violation of the USA federal money laundering act of 1986. It's called smurfing or structuring. You are structuring your transactions to avoid filling out the form. And it's illegal. There's no grey area. If you have ever done this, you violated USA federal law. Stop doing it. And talk to an attorney who actually knows something about federal law before you get yourself or other people put in federal prison. Because of truth in sentencing, you can't even get parole/early release from federal prison.

Just fill out the durn form. Is it really so hard to be honest? There is no reason for a poker player to conceal his identity. You are breaking the law for no benefit to yourself whatsoever. At least the blackjack player who is banned around the world has an excuse for wanting to avoid a paper trail. You've got nothing.

They don't hassle you for properly reporting the money. Depending on the amount of money, they may count the money themselves to verify that you put the correct amount. This happened at DTW, the amount was about $100K in combined US and UK currency. Don't get excited, we don't play blackjack any more so don't look for any more exciting adventures involving large sums of cash!

They just want to know why you are carrying all the cash and get the form filled out. It is completely legal, and they see it everyday. If you don't declare, though, they will think you have something to hide and could get you into deep trouble.

Last time when I came in through SFO with over $10K, it took only a few minutes to get through the declared line. When I looked back, there was a huge line over at the green area and a lot of people were waiting for x-rayed. I didn't even have to go through x-ray when my declaration was completed. It took less time to go through the red area than the green area.

Which makes me think back to the last few airports I've travelled through, both the red and green customs channels have been perfectly unstaffed! Admitedly they were not US destinations, but still, you just walk right through.

Yeah. Shanghai, China: My wife set off the radiation detector (residue from a nuclear test) in the green line--and nobody responded!

Too funny -- "honest idiot" indeed.

Unless you were into illegal activities why would you be an idiot for reporting the fact that you were carrying $99,990,000 more than the legal limit? If it's my money they can't take it away...unless I don't report it. Honestly I think you'd have to be an idiot NOT to report it.

I think the point was that it's idiotic to carry around $100MM in cash.

It's not the "legal limit", it's merely the non-reporting limit.

Anybody who is strong enough to do that is not going to get hassled. (The largest bill currently in circulation is the $100; that much money weighs over a ton.)

The largest bill in regular circulation of a freely convertible stable currency is 1000 Swiss Francs, at today's exchange rate approximately $968. $100,000,000 carried in 1000 Swiss Franc notes will weigh a lot less. But you could carry 100,000,000 in bearer bonds in a briefcase - and they are as much subject to these restrictions as currency is.

*edited to add - Research shows that there is a 10000 Singapore dollar note worth in excess of 7000 USD at current exchange rates - don't know if this is widely circulated though.

This is absolutely false.