FinCEN Supplemental Alert on Fuel Smuggling and Tax Evasion Schemes on the Southern Border Associated with Mexico-Based Cartels (FIN-2026-Alert003)

See 31 U.S.C. § 5312(a)(2); 31 C.F.R. § 1010.100(t).
Naphtha is a type of refined or partly refined light distillate that can be further blended to produce high-grade motor
gasoline or jet fuel. See U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), Naphtha.
See FinCEN, FIN-2025-Alert002, “FinCEN Alert on Oil Smuggling Schemes on the U.S. Southwest Border Associated
with Mexico-Based Cartels” (May 1, 2025).
Huachicol is a term in Mexico broadly defined as the theft, adulteration, or smuggling of hydrocarbons such as fuel
and oil.
See Financial Times, “How Smuggled U.S. Fuel Funds Mexico’s Cartels” (June 11, 2025); Reuters, “How a ‘Dark Fleet’
of Tankers Helped a Mexican Cartel Build a Fuel-Smuggling Empire” (Oct. 22, 2025).
FIN-2026-Alert003 June 30, 2026
FinCEN Supplemental Alert on Fuel Smuggling and Tax Evasion Schemes on the Southern Border Associated with Mexico-Based Cartels The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s (Treasury) Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) is issuing this supplemental Alert to advise financial institutions1 to be vigilant in detecting, identifying, and reporting suspicious activity connected to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), Sinaloa Cartel, Gulf Cartel, and other Mexico-based transnational criminal organizations (TCOs)—frequently referred to as the “Cartels”—smuggling gasoline, diesel, naphtha,2 and other fuel from the United States across the U.S. southern border or through U.S. ports into Mexico in schemes involving Mexican tax evasion known as fiscal fuel theft (huachicol fiscal). This publication supplements FinCEN’s May 2025 Alert on Oil Smuggling Schemes on the U.S. Southwest Border Associated with Mexico-Based Cartels (May 2025 Cartel Oil Smuggling Alert).3 Fiscal fuel theft refers to the circumvention of Mexican taxes on fuel that is illicitly imported from the United States via various smuggling methods. These schemes reflect an evolution of traditional fuel and oil theft (huachicol)4 in Mexico. Fiscal fuel theft and traditional fuel and oil theft have, together, become the most significant non-drug illicit revenue source for the Cartels. In recent years, the Cartels and their fuel smugglers (huachicoleros) are increasingly purchasing and smuggling fuel from complicit U.S. fuel distribution companies (hereafter “U.S. fuel traders”) for sale on the Mexican black market, with public reporting estimating that a quarter to a third of all fuel sold in Mexico may be illicit.5 Smuggling methods can vary; however, smuggled fuel is typically misclassified in customs documentation, often masked by bribed Mexican government officials, including customs and tax officials, or concealed in other ways to circumvent Mexican taxes on imported fuel. Through these schemes, the Cartels are diverting tens of billions of dollars a year in tax revenue from Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) Filing Request:
FinCEN requests that financial institutions reference this supplemental Alert in SAR field 2 (Filing Institution Note to FinCEN) and the narrative by including the key term “FIN-2026-FISCALFUELTHEFT.”

FinCEN Supplemental Alert on Fuel Smuggling and Tax Evasion Schemes on the Southern Border Associated with Mexico-Based Cartels (FIN-2026-Alert003)

Lineage: In force