监管者想动原油市场

henry

Regulators Target Oil Industry
FTC Oversight
Might Be Extended
To Trading Markets
By SIOBHAN HUGHES
May 6, 2008; Page A4

As energy prices surge -- oil briefly surpassed $120 a barrel Monday in New York -- U.S. regulators are poised to expand their oversight of oil companies and energy markets in ways that Congress once thought unnecessary.

The Federal Trade Commission last week said it would delve into the workings of the oil industry, examining scenarios such as the withholding of supplies from the market, as it prepares to write rules banning market manipulation. Acting under authority granted in a 2007 energy law, the FTC's powers may be great enough to reach into the oil-trading markets, competing with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the traditional overseer of energy-trading markets.

"It can be as big as the FTC wants to make it," said I. Michael Greenberger, who was once the director of the division of trading and markets at the CFTC. "They have the power to do something that would create major transparency in these markets."

The effort to bolster regulators' powers comes as politicians are scrambling to demonstrate toughness in dealing with oil producers. To bolster U.S. leverage over Middle East oil producers, Senate Democrats are threatening to block various arms deals with Saudi Arabia and other members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. The House Judiciary Committee is holding hearings this month on high gasoline prices, and has called on OPEC's secretary general, Abdalla Salem El-Badri, to testify.

For now, no one knows whether or to what extent speculation might be driving up prices. But with oil prices breaching $120 a barrel and closing Monday at a nominal record of $119.97 a barrel, Washington is more willing to challenge a free-market philosophy that has long reigned in the energy markets.

The last time an agency gained broad new powers to monitor energy trading was in 2005. That was when Congress gave the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission a mandate to prosecute market manipulation, with the power to impose penalties of $1 million a day. One result: The FERC went after hedge fund Amaranth Advisors LLC, which collapsed in 2006 after a wrong-way bet on natural-gas futures.

This time, oil companies and energy-trading markets are under scrutiny. One hitch will be the extent to which FTC regulators are willing to venture into the CFTC's regulatory turf.

"We are initially casting a wide net and seeking feedback on the types of manipulative activity we should consider prohibiting," said David Wales, deputy director of the FTC's bureau of competition. "This does include possible market speculation in petroleum, but we also have to consider the expertise and potentially overlapping jurisdiction of other federal agencies."

The FTC's move isn't the only way more regulatory muscle may be brought to bear on the energy markets. The CFTC would gain powers to oversee unregulated online energy-futures trading if a farm bill to which the measure is attached passes Congress.