I'm planning a trip to the USA soon (from Germany). I'd like to know how much cash I can bring in without problems.

Just to clarify, I am not talking about the $10000-or-file-a-form limit. I'm talking about the point where the authorities will assume that with that much cash, I must be a drug dealer (I'm not), and will confiscate my money with little or no hope of my ever seeing it again.

I realize this is an open-ended question, and there is no precise threshhold -- that much depends on the authorities I come in contact with. But can someone give me some idea of where the effective boundary is?

It's worse than that. It casts shade on the purpose for your visit, risking a refusal.

You're a citizen of an advanced country that has a state-of-the-art banking system, competent and uncorrupted law enforcement, and is a member of G8 and all the relevant banking treaties. Not every German travels to the US, only certain ones: and the ones who visit for (your visit purpose here) tend to reside in a certain socioeconomic class. The vast majority of them simply use that banking system in the normal way. Which makes you a "high nail": a standout.

So this raises questions about you. Aside from the question of civil forfeiture, it raises the question of whether you should be admitted in the first place.

You would first, need a darned good reason for wanting to do this, that jibes with your story, believable documents, and allowable purposes for visiting the U.S. And second, have that reason be one that sounds perfectly reasonable to US CBP.

Remember how immigration control works. They make a presumption of immigrant intent: if you refuse to defend yourself, they presume your intent is immigration. That is reasonable, since their mission is controlling immigration by stopping immigrants, and only allowing in people who are short-term travelers. Then, they allow you to present your story and facts (documents) to prove yourself not an immigrant.

Your main weapon in rebutting immigrant intent is to show ties at home. One of the "ties" they like to see is an active, regular banking life. Having a pile of cash suggests the very opposite: a person who is "unbanked"*. Such people tend to overstay their original promise, get in trouble, seek social services or employment, or even resort to crime. Also, they tend to be poorly rooted back home, and that introduces the risk of them immigrating.

So the pile of cash will "light up" questions like this about your visit. Aside from having a reasonable reason for the cash pile, you should be well prepared to document your home ties back in Germany. Owning a home, being politically active, having a well-developed career that doesn't lend itself to telecommuting, that kind of thing.

You'd be sorting all this out with immigration control (CBP) right there at the immigration desk at JFK Airport, and if they refuse you, you'd cross an ocean twice for nothing. Here are two ways to dodge that.

• Don't rely on VWP; apply for a visa. Let CBP work out their concerns in advance.


• Book via Dublin or Shannon. Those airports have CBP Preclearance, which means the CBP desk is right there. If they refuse you, you can grab your bags, leave the airport, and head to the nearest pub to drown your sorrows in a 425ml Guinness.

* Unbanked: A concept we are VERY familiar with here in the US, and often taken as a bad sign. Again, within the demographic of ordinary travelers, this either means a very unusual philosophy on money, or (will be presumed to be) inability to bank, due to a blacklist arising from bouncing checks and not covering it, presumably because of not having the money.

I realize this is an open-ended question, and there is no precise threshhold -- that much depends on the authorities I come in contact with. But can someone give me some idea of where the effective boundary is?

Your question cannot be answered, as the way you've asked it implies. Because there is no precise threshold, and because it depends on specifically which authorities you encounter, there is no effective boundary.

All we can tell you is that if you carry enough cash to have to declare it, and you do declare it, you're guaranteed to encounter CBP. CBP does not share the policy that some municipal police forces have of abusing civil asset forfeiture to acquire resources for the department, so filing the form probably does not increase your risk very much.

If you fail to declare your cash despite exceeding the limit, then there is a chance you won't encounter any authorities over the cash, but if you do encounter CBP in a spot check, you're pretty much guaranteed to lose the cash.

First off, let's differentiate the two Civil Asset Forfeitures(CAFs):

• Police - This tends to be focused on people committing (or merely suspected of committing) smaller crimes (i.e you had illegal drugs on you) and having assets seized. The US Supreme Court recently limited actions like this, but they still occur with some frequency. Most of the CAF examples you find via searches are of this type.


• CBP - These tend to be aimed at people believed to be actively doing something like smuggling, laundering money, etc.

The CBP doesn't seem to do this as often, but that's probably because there's a lot more police and people in the general population than go through customs. The largest customs case of CAF centers around an Albanian man who tried to fly with undeclared cash. CBP miscounted the cash and then seized it under a variety of laws aimed at money laundering.

But can someone give me some idea of where the effective boundary is?

The main thing is you don't need to stand out to where they decide to inquire about why you have a lot of cash. CBP might just check your documents and let you through. If you like to smoke marijuana or do drugs, I would make sure I refrained from that for some time before and during your trip, lest a CBP dog indicate you, or your baggage, smell like drugs.

I would also get a visa. You might not need one for your visit, but it's far less likely that someone who has gone through that hassle for a simple visit is trying to launder money.

I know you're aware, but it bears repeating that if you want to bring more than $10,000 in cash, be sure to declare it because the CBP website directly states

Failure to declare currency in amounts more than $10,000 can result in its seizure.

There's a large chance they will use CAF to seize it if you're caught like this.

There is no such thing as a lower bound. Civil forfeiture laws and practices vary greatly from state to state. See, for example, https://ij.org/report/policing-for-profit/grading-state-federal-civil-forfeiture-laws/

It is certainly a rather unfair and frustrating practice of law enforcement, but on the other hand, it's not common either and the chance of you are encountering such a situation as a tourist a quite small.

The best protection is to carry no or little cash. Credit and debit cards are widely accepted and if you really need cash for anything, you can get it easily at the nearest ATM. Cash is used less and less: For example the food truck outside of Boston South station where you buy your morning coffee doesn't accept cash at all: plastic only. I sometimes go months without using cash.

There is no safe limit regarding civil asset forfeiture: the bulk of the confiscated cash is small amounts not warranting the hassle of a contest. Basically try to be white and reasonably well-dressed (like a large-scale drug dealer would be) and you'll not likely be bothered. The problem with actually declaring large amounts of cash is that this information will immediately be passed on to DHS or local law enforcement agents which will likely pick on you "by chance" when you leave the airport premises.

So basically don't bring large amounts of cash into the U.S., whether declared or not, if you don't want them to get stolen by U.S. "law" enforcement. Particularly not if you don't have the kind of race/standing/backup to look like a lot of trouble.