[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Page 14022]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                                  CFTC

  Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. President, I rise for a few minutes this evening to 
talk about a couple events from today. First of all, the price of oil 
today hit over $140 a barrel--another, I think, tragic milestone as it 
relates to the impact on our economy and the challenges we face as oil 
prices continue to go higher and higher and higher.
  I also note for my colleagues that the House took very aggressive 
action today in basically ordering the Commodity Futures Trading 
Commission, on an overwhelming 402-19 vote, to take action to utilize 
its authority, including its emergency powers, which is critical for 
the CFTC to do if it wants to have proper oversight of these oil 
futures markets.
  Now, I know this is something we have been pushing here in the 
Senate, saying there are loopholes we still need to close. Many of my 
colleagues joined in a letter last month--22 of us--to the CFTC telling 
them to use their authority and to act aggressively. They came back 
with a half step saying they were going to start collecting new 
information from the British regulators that oversee some of our oil 
markets in the U.S.
  We told the CFTC that was not good enough. We told them to use their 
existing authority to start collecting information directly from the 
IntercontinentalExchange Futures Europe, a dark market that is subject 
to British oversight but operates in the United States under a CFTC 
staff no-action policy.
  I think those pleas by us have basically gone ignored or at least 
half steps have been taken by the CFTC. So I was very pleased today 
that H.R. 6377 passed the House of Representatives 402 to 19. So there 
has been an outstanding margin of bipartisan support in the House of 
Representatives to pass a bill that requires the CFTC to use its 
existing authority, including emergency authority. This bill does not 
say the CFTC ``may'' utilize its authorities; it says they ``shall.'' 
So it is very direct. It says those broad emergency authorities that 
include investigating excessive speculation, reducing position limits--
basically overall stricter position limits--and including limiting or 
suspending trading. These are things the CFTC has the power to do in 
its emergency authorities to make sure excessive speculation and 
manipulation are not occurring in the markets.
  So I want to say I think this is a very bold step the House of 
Representatives has done. They did this very quickly today, and in a 
very aggressive, bipartisan fashion.
  I hope the Senate would take the same aggressive measure as soon as 
possible, and in the same overwhelming majority, to show we are serious 
about reining in excessive speculation and potential manipulation in 
the oil markets.
  I thank the Presiding Officer and yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.

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