Over the years I’ve often heard the question “why are the U.S. House and Senate Agricultural committees given jurisdiction and oversight of financial firms?” This question sometimes appears in the managed futures course I teach at DePaul University.
With the testimony of Jon Corzine former CEO of MF Global before the House Agricultural Committee on December 8th, 2011 and his testimony with the Senate Agricultural Committee on December 13th, 2011 regarding the bankruptcy of MF Global, the 8th largest U.S. bankruptcy, this would be a good opportunity to discuss this question.
Let’s start with the basics:
The U.S. Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee maintains jurisdiction on 17 topics including agricultural economics and research, agricultural commodities and price stabilization. Four of the five subcommittees including the Subcommittee on Commodities, Markets, Trade and Risk Management have oversight of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).
The U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Agriculture has jurisdiction of oversight on 20 various topics including agricultural economics and research, stabilization of agricultural prices and commodity exchanges. The General Farm Commodities and Risk Management subcommittee maintains oversight of the commodity exchanges.
Of course this begs the question, why are these committees given jurisdiction over commodity exchanges and the CFTC?
To find the answer, let’s take a walk down history lane:
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