Commodity Futures Trading Commission

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is an agency of the federal government charged with regulating commodity and financial futures and options contracts and markets. The CFTC serves three key functions. Its first mission is to protect market users and the public from fraud, manipulation, and abusive practices related to the sale of these instruments. Second, the CFTC regulates financial practices in the market to ensure that the entire market remains financially sound and that the markets continue to function with financial integrity. Third, the CFTC uses its regulatory powers to help the markets fulfill their key social functions of providing a means for price discovery and the hedging of price risk.

Organized commodity futures markets arose in the United States about 1850 with the establishment ...