Federal fraud sentencing ranges drop for some defendants on November 1. The sentencing date decides who benefits.

September 10, 2026

If you are under federal investigation or charged with a white-collar offense, in most cases one number does more to shape the recommended range than any other: the loss amount. Federal judges begin with a base offense level, then add levels according to the loss amount the court finds, a number the government proposes and the defense can contest. More levels means a longer recommended prison range.

On November 1, 2026, the dollar figures attached to those levels rise for the first time since 2015. The change is an inflation adjustment, not a redesign. But for a defendant whose loss figure falls between an old threshold and a new one, it is the difference between one guideline range and a lower one. The amendment is not retroactive. Whether a defendant is sentenced on October 30 or November 2 can change the recommended range before a word is argued.

The loss table rises about 36 percent, and more at two rungs

The loss table sits in Section 2B1.1(b)(1) of the United States Sentencing Guidelines. It is a ladder with 16 rungs, 15 of which add levels: cross a dollar threshold, add two more. The U.S. Sentencing Commission adjusted every threshold for inflation since 2014, the base year of the last adjustment, using a multiplier of 1.36. The ladder keeps the same number of rungs and the same level increases at each step. It simply takes more money to reach each one.

The Commission then rounded each figure to a clean number, and the rounding was not uniform. Individual thresholds rose anywhere from 33 to 58 percent. Two rungs of the loss table moved the most: the 8-level step, which jumped from $95,000 to $150,000, and the 20-level step, which jumped from $9.5 million to $15 million. Both rose 57.9 percent against a 36 percent baseline.

U.S.S.G. § 2B1.1(b)(1) loss table, before and after November 1, 2026

For many defendants, that means two fewer levels

The arithmetic is simple. The thresholds moved; the level increases did not. A defendant whose loss figure falls between an old threshold and the corresponding new one drops two levels.

–     A $100,000 loss goes from +8 to +6.

–     A $1.8 million loss goes from +16 to +14.

–     A $10 million loss goes from +20 to +18.

Two levels is not cosmetic. On the sentencing table, which did not change, a defendant in Criminal History Category I, the lowest, faces a recommended range of 33 to 41 months at level 20 and 27 to 33 months at level 18. At level 30 the range is 97 to 121 months; at level 28, 78 to 97. So for that defendant a two-level drop is worth six to eight months at level 20 and 19 to 24 months at level 30. The exact effect depends on where the defendant sits on the table and on criminal history, but the direction is the same everywhere: down.

The fine tables changed on the same schedule. The table used to set fines for individuals in Section 5E1.2 and the table used to set fines for organizations in Section 8C2.4 were both adjusted for inflation. But the Commission wrote a special instruction into each one: for offenses committed on or after November 1, 2015 but before November 1, 2026, courts keep using the fine ranges in effect on November 1, 2025. So fines turn on the date of the offense. Loss, as explained next, turns on the date of sentencing.

The line is the sentencing date, and it is a hard one

Section 1B1.11 of the Guidelines tells a court to use the Guidelines Manual in effect on the day of sentencing. The exception that matters here is when the current Manual would produce a harsher range than the one in effect when the crime was committed, which the Supreme Court held in Peugh v. United States would violate the Ex Post Facto Clause. The new loss table lowers offense levels, so that exception never comes into play. The rule is the default: sentenced on or after November 1, 2026, new table; sentenced before, old table.

The amendment is not retroactive as promulgated. The Commission did not add it to the list in Section 1B1.10(d) of amendments that can support a sentence reduction, so a defendant already sentenced under the old table has no path back to court on the strength of this change. The Commission has the authority to designate an amendment retroactive in a later cycle. It has not done so, and no relief is available today.

That creates a cliff. Two people with identical conduct and identical loss figures can face materially different recommended ranges based on nothing but the date of sentencing.

There is one catch, and it matters. Section 1B1.11 also contains what practitioners call the one-book rule: the Manual in effect on the sentencing date applies in its entirety. A court may not take the new loss table from the November 2026 Manual and the rest of the calculation from the 2025 Manual. So if the November 2026 Manual, applied whole, would produce a higher range for a particular defendant than the Manual in effect when the offense was committed, the court applies that older Manual as a whole and the new thresholds are unavailable. For most defendants the new Manual is the better book. It is not a given, and the calculation has to be run both ways.

For anyone whose sentencing is scheduled for September or October 2026, and whose loss figure sits near one of the shifted thresholds, this is a conversation to have with counsel immediately. Whether to ask the court for a continuance is a judgment call that depends on the judge, the district, and the posture of the case. But it is a call to make deliberately, not by default. And even where a sentencing goes forward before November 1, the Commission’s own conclusion that the old thresholds had not kept pace with inflation is a legitimate basis to seek a variance under 18 U.S.C. Section 3553(a).

The overhaul you may have read about did not happen

Late last year, and again this spring, alerts circulated describing a sweeping rewrite of how loss is calculated in fraud cases. Read those with care. Most of what they described was never adopted.

On December 12, 2025, the Commission released nine proposed amendments for public comment. One of them, titled Economic Crimes, would have collapsed the loss table from 16 rungs to eight and eliminated any enhancement for losses of $15,000 or less. It would have redefined the “sophisticated means” enhancement. It floated a new reduction for defendants who, before learning of an investigation, stopped the conduct and returned the money, and a separate reduction for coercion or duress. It also proposed something that cut the other way: a new enhancement of up to four levels for substantial non-economic harm to victims. A separate proposed amendment would have created a Chapter Three adjustment for post-offense rehabilitation.

One thing that was never proposed, despite what some alerts reported, was a change to how intended loss is counted. The Commission listed intended-versus-actual loss as a priority in August 2025 and then published no proposed amendment text on it. The current treatment of intended loss was never proposed for change.

On April 16, 2026, the Commission voted unanimously to promulgate seven amendments. The Economic Crimes proposal was not among them, and neither were the post-offense rehabilitation and sophisticated means proposals. Of everything proposed for Section 2B1.1, only the inflation adjustment survived. The loss table keeps its 16 rungs. The sophisticated means enhancement is unchanged. Intended loss is counted exactly as before. There is no new credit for returning the money. Anyone planning a sentencing strategy around the December proposals is planning around rules that do not exist.

Two other changes arrive the same day

Two of the seven amendments taking effect November 1 matter to white-collar defendants as well. One governs how multiple counts combine, which matters because most white-collar indictments charge several. The other reorganizes the sentencing options.

Grouping rules consolidated. The five guidelines in Chapter Three, Part D that governed how overlapping counts combine into a single offense level, Sections 3D1.1 through 3D1.5, were replaced with one guideline at Section 3D1.1. The Commission estimated that 93 percent of the nearly 11,000 multiple-count cases sentenced in fiscal year 2024 would have seen no change in sentence under the new rule, and 99 percent of all cases sentenced that year. Across multiple-count cases, it projected the average sentence would move from 99.5 months to 98.9 months. Those are the Commission’s estimates, and they describe the aggregate. Grouping is fact-specific, and the new rule should be run against the actual indictment rather than assumed to be neutral, particularly given the one-book rule.

Sentencing options reorganized. The sentencing table stayed where it has always been, in Chapter Five, Part A, but for the first time it carries a guideline number, Section 5A1.1(c), and Part A was renamed “Determination of Sentencing Range and Sentencing Options.” The instructions on which alternatives to prison are available in each zone, including probation, home detention, community confinement, and split sentences, used to be scattered across Section 5B1.1 and Section 5C1.1 and its application notes. They now sit together in a single table at Section 5A1.1(b). The numbers on the sentencing table did not change. The reorganization makes the non-prison options easier to find and, at the lower ranges, easier to argue for.

Separately, the Commission examined the 298 specific offense characteristics in Chapter Two, the provisions that raise or lower an offense level based on how a crime was committed, and deleted 26 that had not applied in a single case in the last five fiscal years. None of the deletions touched Section 2B1.1.

What is still in play, and what is not

The November 1 amendments were submitted to Congress on April 30, 2026. Under 28 U.S.C. Section 994(p), they take effect by operation of law on the date the Commission specified unless Congress passes legislation to modify or disapprove them. Plan on these taking effect.

The loss-table restructuring is a different story. On August 27, 2026, the Commission adopted its final priorities for the 2026-2027 amendment cycle, published in the Federal Register on September 3. Neither Section 2B1.1 nor the loss table appears on the list. Instead, the Commission is undertaking a broad evaluation of the Guidelines and federal sentencing practice ahead of the Guidelines Manual’s 40th anniversary, through regional hearings and roundtables, along with a review of its own Rules of Practice and Procedure ahead of their 30th. A loss-table rewrite could resurface inside that larger review. But nothing is scheduled. Because the amendment cycle runs on a fixed annual clock, with proposals in December, a vote by May 1, and an effective date of November 1, the earliest a new proposal could take effect is November 1, 2027, and given the Commission’s stated agenda we do not expect a loss-table rewrite before November 1, 2028. That is our read of the calendar, not a Commission statement.

Four questions to put to counsel now

–     What is the loss figure, and is the government’s number right? The government’s number is a position, not a finding. The court decides loss, and that dispute is independent of any amendment.

–     Where does that figure fall against the old thresholds and the new ones? If it sits between them, the November 1 date matters.

–     If sentencing is set before November 1, what is the plan? Continuance, variance argument, or both. And has the calculation been run under both Manuals, so the one-book rule does not produce a surprise?

–     Which of the headlines actually apply? Several widely circulated alerts described the proposed overhaul as if it had been enacted. It was not.

Sources

–     U.S. Sent’g Comm’n, Amendments to the Sentencing Guidelines 1, 27-28, 36-38, 49-50, 76-78, 91-95 (Apr. 30, 2026) (reader-friendly version), https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/amendment-process/reader-friendly-amendments/202605_RF.pdf. Simplification at 1; loss table at 27-28; fine tables and special instructions at 28, 36-38; Multiple Counts at 49-50, 76-78; Sentencing Options at 91-95.

–     Sentencing Guidelines for United States Courts, 91 Fed. Reg. 24,088 (May 4, 2026).

–     U.S. Sent’g Comm’n, 2025-2026 Proposed Amendments 57-82 (Dec. 12, 2025) (reader-friendly version), https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/amendment-process/reader-friendly-amendments/202512_rf-proposed.pdf; Sentencing Guidelines for United States Courts, 90 Fed. Reg. 59,660 (Dec. 19, 2025).

–     Press Release, U.S. Sent’g Comm’n, U.S. Sentencing Commission Adopts Package of Good Government Guideline Amendments to Simplify, Streamline Federal Sentencing (Apr. 16, 2026), https://www.ussc.gov/about/news/press-releases/april-16-2026.

–     Final Priorities for Amendment Cycle, 91 Fed. Reg. 56,732 (Sept. 3, 2026); Press Release, U.S. Sent’g Comm’n, U.S. Sentencing Commission Votes to Prioritize Review of Federal Sentencing Practices and Its Policymaking Procedures (Aug. 27, 2026), https://www.ussc.gov/about/news/press-releases/august-27-2026.

–     U.S. Sent’g Guidelines Manual §§ 1B1.10(a)(2)(A), (d), 1B1.11(a)-(b) (U.S. Sent’g Comm’n 2025), https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/guidelines-manual/2025/CHAPTER_1.pdf; U.S. Sent’g Guidelines Manual ch. 5, pt. A, sentencing tbl. (U.S. Sent’g Comm’n 2025), https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/guidelines-manual/2025/Sentencing_Table.pdf.

–     28 U.S.C. § 994(p); 18 U.S.C. §§ 3553(a), 3582(c)(2).

–     Peugh v. United States, 569 U.S. 530, 533 (2013).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ryan K. Stumphauzer is a partner and founder of Stumphauzer Kolaya & Sloman, PLLC. He served for more than six years as a federal prosecutor in the Southern District of Florida, including as Deputy Chief of the Health Care Fraud Unit, and represents corporations and executives in government enforcement matters, white-collar criminal litigation, and internal investigations. rstumphauzer@skslegal.com · 305.614.1401