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ARTICLE · 01 JANUARY 2026

The Desk - January Edition

Moore & Van Allen, PLLC
Moore & Van Allen, PLLC
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Moore & Van Allen, PLLC

Moore & Van Allen, PLLC

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Welcome back! We wanted to give everyone an extra day to ease back in before sending through a very long email about all the things that happened in swaps-land during December. And a lot happened! We have a new Chair of the CFTC. Former Acting Chair Caroline Pham landed at Moon Pay and Michael Selig has been sworn in as the Chair of the CFTC. Before the year closed, we got a lot of updates from the CFTC, many of which we walk through below.

United StatesFinance and Banking
Barrett Morris
Barrett Morris
Nader Raja
Nader Raja
Tiffany Payne
Tiffany Payne
Stuart B. Armstrong
Stuart B. Armstrong
Drew P. Newman
Drew P. Newman

Enforcement Round-up

Wells and Investigative Process Enhancements.  On December 1, 2025, former Acting Chair Pham announced another significant enforcement-related policy change in what was a transformative year for the CFTC and the Division of Enforcement (DOE) under her leadership.  Consistent with certain changes at the SEC, the CFTC amended its Rules of Practice and Rules Relating to Investigations to provide greater transparency and strengthen due process protections, notably by “discontinuing the practice of ‘secret’ charges.”  The amendments include, among other changes:

  • In lieu of adjudicatory proceedings under subpart B of part 10, the Commission may accept an offer of settlement by an order instituting proceedings pursuant to the Commodity Exchange Act, and making findings and imposing remedial sanctions, and the Commission may accept such an offer of settlement either by Commission meeting or by the Commission’s seriatim process.

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