CFTC

Van Helsing: "The strength of the vampire is that nobody will believe in him."

America's debt to Wall Street has soared since 1945 - and although the banks were rescued at public expense, the public's been left holding the bag for the recent drop in housing prices: more »

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While the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform bill did too little to address the problem of “too big to fail” banks, one of the big wins for reformers was the bill’s strong derivatives chapter which drags risky “over the counter” derivatives trades out of the shadows and into the light of day.

Reformers won strong provisions for clearing, margin and transparency, which will force the big banks to put real money behind their bets. Reformers also succeeded in securing mandatory position limits for key commodities that will protect consumers from price spikes caused by excessive speculation.

But now that the Wall Street reform bill is in the agency rulemaking process, bank lobbyists are back in droves, descending on regulators in an attempt to force giant loopholes into the law – loopholes worth billions of dollars for the big banks. more »

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