John Damgard, the president of the Futures Industry Association, issued the following statement in response to today's approval by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission of new rules prohibiting fraud and manipulation in futures, swaps and cash commodity markets.
"We are disappointed that the final rules do not reflect the extensive comments submitted to the CFTC by the FIA and other interested parties, and we are concerned that the CFTC did not provide more guidance on how it intends to apply the sweeping new powers that these rules will implement. We strongly support the CFTC's authority to pursue any and all deliberate attempts to manipulate prices or defraud participants in these markets, but the lack of clarity on how the broad new standards in the final rules will be applied has the potential to chill legitimate trading and reduce market liquidity."