Compliance In Commodity Derivatives Markets

On June 21 and 22, lawyers, compliance professionals and commodity traders convened in Houston to discuss current compliance matters and the state of commodity markets, with the focus on energy commodities as well as carbon and environmental products. The following themes emerged from the panels with speakers from private industry, consultancies and regulators, such as the Commodity Futures Trading Commission ("CFTC"), the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ("FERC") and the National Futures Association ("NFA").

1. Enforcement

In 2021 and 2022, the industry experienced a record number of enforcement actions from the CFTC and the NFA, with record settlement amounts. Enforcement focused on fraud and manipulation, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act ("FCPA")-like enforcement and misappropriation of material non-public information in commodity markets, failure to register in appropriate capacity and substantive regulatory violations, such as reporting. Importantly, in