Updated: 5th November 2025
Starting a cash-based business in the United States under the Money Services Business (MSB) category is one of the hardest paths for entrepreneurs. This is especially true if your goal is money transmission, cross-border payments, or remittances. While the unbanked population in America may seem like an attractive customer base, the realities of banking, compliance, and operational risk make this business model extremely difficult to sustain.
This page explains the challenges in detail, highlights the few available options, and provides insight into why shifting customers away from cash may be a better long-term strategy.
Access to banking is the single greatest barrier. For MSBs, banking access is already a major hurdle. For MSBs dealing in cash, the challenge escalates to near impossibility. Even established operators with years of history and large compliance budgets struggle to maintain their accounts. New entrants face even steeper odds.
Banks hesitate for several reasons:
The end result is that many banks simply refuse to deal with cash-based MSBs, regardless of the strength of the compliance program.
Many entrepreneurs believe that if they have a strong compliance program, they will automatically qualify for banking. This is not true. The quality of compliance is judged not by the business itself but by regulators, auditors, and bank compliance officers.