The US Senate voted last month not to give regulators authority
over energy and metal derivatives, even though, that same week, a
senate committee heard testimony that Enron might have manipulated
electricity prices through under-regulated futures contracts traded
online.
Senator Dianne Feinstein proposed an amendment to the energy bill
that sought to bring both energy and metal derivatives and
electronic derivatives exchanges back under the regulatory
authority of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). They
were all exempted from CFTC regulation by the Commodity Futures
Modernization Act of 2000 which was pushed through by Senator Phil
Gramm who also led the resistance to Feinstein's amendment.
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Feinstein, the Capitol and Gramm:
attempts to bring greater
regulation to energy derivatives are meeting stiff
opposition |
Opposition also came from the SEC, Alan Greenspan and Paul
O'Neill, who fear it could hamper the $73 trillion US OTC
derivatives market. Gramm said: "The entire financial sector...
