CFTC Faces `Major Issue’ On `Special Conditions’ for Ag Swaps

A Commodity Futures Trading Commission lawyer suggested Aug. 5 that his agency is facing a “major policy issue” regarding whether over-the-counter agricultural swaps should be subject to any special conditions or protections beyond what other swaps receive as the agency proposes rules to oversee the products.

In a presentation to the CFTC’s Agriculture Advisory Committee, Donald Heitman, a special counsel in the Division of Market Oversight, said that in language under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, Congress “seems to imply that farmers and other persons trading agriculture swaps should be subject to some kind of additional, ...