Oilman Hamm Demands Price-Crash Probe, Suspects Manipulation (1)

Continental Resources Inc. Chairman Harold Hamm is asking regulators to investigate the spasms in oil trading on Monday that pushed prices into unprecedented negative territory.

The rapid plunge -- with the May contract for West Texas Intermediate falling some $40 in the last 22 minutes of trading -- “strongly raises the suspicion of market manipulation or a flawed new computer model,” the company said in a complaint filed with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange on Tuesday. The contract settled at minus $37.63 a barrel.

The plunge into the previously-unimaginable zone of sub-zero prices has stunned global markets, which are reeling from ...