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.
| Feinstein, the Capitol and Gramm: attempts to bring greater regulation to energy derivatives are meeting stiff opposition |
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Opposition also came from the SEC, Alan Greenspan and Paul O'Neill, who fear it could hamper the $73 trillion US OTC derivatives market.