In politics, the “revolving door” is a movement of executive personnel between roles as legislators, regulators and the industries affected by the legislation and regulations…
a revolving door that shuffles former federal employees into jobs as judges, lobbyists, consultants, strategists, and senior executives.
This can be described as a “Protection Racket” as effective as the mafia protection racket once was.
The CFTC was embarrassed, forcing them to reluctantly impose a small $650,000 fine on JP Morgan for fraudulently reporting “large trader” data, “Repeatedly”. See: CFTC Charges JP Morgan With Reporting Fraud http://www.cftc.gov/PressRoom/PressReleases/pr6968-14
Governments have become criminal institutions that protect their money masters, and member institutions; this apparently is the case with the White House, Congress, CFTC regulators, JP Morgan, et al.
A People’s Grand Jury could investigate these institutions, government officials, judges, and corporate executives and end this criminal activity… ~Ron
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Another Settlement – JP Morgan Receives Slap On The Wrist Despite Years Of Fraudulent CFTC Data
By Mike Krieger of Liberty Blitzkrieg blog
The Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) has been long viewed as one of the most corrupt of American institutions – and that’s saying a lot. Putting aside all the accusations with regard to silver manipulation in recent years, the most stunning controversy occurred back in 2010 when a retiring judge accused the other remaining judge of being a total bought and paid for Wall Street crony.
The retiring judge was George Painter, who accused fellow judge Bruce Levine of not once ever ruling in favor of an investor in his 20 years on the bench. Not only that, but he claimed this was the result of a promise Levine made to Wendy Gramm, the former head of the CFTC and the wife of Phil Gramm. Phil Gramm was the Congressman who spearheaded the repeal of Glass-Steagall in 1999, which is seen by many (including myself) as one of the most catastrophic pieces of legislation in American history since it laid the groundwork for the financial crisis of 2008, as well as the continued cancerous permanence and power of TBTF banks. FiredogLake covered the CFTC controversy in 2010:
An Administrative Law Judge at the CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission), George Painter, revealed in his retirement letter that a colleague of his, Judge Bruce Levine, has never awarded a case in favor of a plaintiff in 20 years on the bench. He traces this back to a deal Levine made with Wendy Gramm, the former head of the CFTC and the wife of Phil Gramm (R-Enron and UBS). Indeed, the numbers check out, at least for the time period we know about; Judge Levine has never decided in favor of a plaintiff, i.e. never decided in favor of an investor crying mistreatment or fraud by a commodity dealer or major broker in commodity futures and derivatives trading.
Here’s why Painter accused Levine of this misconduct: there are only two Administrative Law judges at the CFTC. “If I simply announced my intention to retire,” Judge Painter says in his letter, “the seven reparation cases on my docket would be reassigned to the only other administrative law judge at the commission, Judge Levine. This I cannot do in good conscience.” He wanted his docket to transfer to an admin law judge at the SEC or FERC instead.
Well it appears nothing has changed at the CFTC. Less than two weeks ago we learned that former CFTC commissioner Scott O’Malia, who had fought hard against any new rules intended to reign in Wall Street practices, was leaving the CFTC to head one the biggest bank lobbying groups in the world, the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA). This is the exact lobbying group that had been pressing against new CFTC rules. Reuters reported that:
The International Swaps and Derivatives Association said on Wednesday that Scott O’Malia, a Republican who often voted against new CFTC policy in the wake of the financial crisis, will become the trade group’s next chief executive. O’Malia will start his new job as of Aug. 18, ISDA said. The news came only days after O’Malia said he planned to leave the CFTC as of Aug. 8.
There is just zero shame at this point.
A staffer for Republican Senator Mitch McConnell – now the Senate Minority leader – from 1992 to 2001, O’Malia focused on energy policy during much of his career.
Links to Mitch McConnell. No surprise there.
ISDA is a global lobby group for non-listed derivatives, counting the world’s largest investment banks among its members, and has frequently fought regulatory efforts to reform the market after the financial crisis.
Moving along to today’s story, we learn that the CFTC will impose a meager $650,000 fine on JP Morgan, despite years of warnings about fraudulent data reports. The CFTC announced that:
Washington, DC – The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) today issued an Order filing and simultaneously settling charges against J.P. Morgan Securities LLC (JPMS), a wholly-owned subsidiary of JPMorgan Chase & Co. and a CFTC-registered Futures Commission Merchant (FCM), for submitting inaccurate reports to the CFTC relating to the required reporting of positions held by certain large traders whose accounts are carried by JPMS. The reporting violations occurred despite the CFTC notifying JPMS of numerous errors in its reports. The CFTC Order requires JPMS to pay a $650,000 civil monetary penalty to address its unlawful conduct. The reports are known as the “large trader” reports and are used by the CFTC in order to evaluate potential market risks and monitor compliance with CFTC requirements.
These reports are also used by investors to make judgments about markets, so just imagine how much money other firms or even individual investors may have lost using JP Morgan’s fraudulent data? I’m sure it was far more than $650k. As the CFTC itself notes:
CFTC Director of Enforcement Aitan Goelman commented: “The large trader reports are vital to the CFTC’s role in monitoring market behavior and are important to members of the public, many of whom rely on that information in forming trading strategies. Therefore, submission of accurate and reliable data to the CFTC is essential. The CFTC will be vigilant in enforcing these rules in order to ensure the integrity of the regulatory structure and to maintain transparency in the markets.”
The CFTC Order specifically finds that since at least 2012, the CFTC was notifying JPMS about errors in its large trader reports, which increased in frequency throughout the year. In December 2012, the CFTC notified JPMS that the on-going problems were unacceptable. JPMS, relying on its third-party vendor that generated the reports for JPMS, assured CFTC staff that the problems would be resolved on or before the end of January 2013. However, JPMS continued to submit large trader reports that contained hundreds of errors throughout the period from February 1, 2013 to February 2014.
So the CFTC claims it will be vigilant. Like, for example, allowing JP Morgan to continue to issue fraudulent reports for well over a year despite repeated warnings, and then ultimately settle for a dollar amount that is probably equivalent to the Dimon family’s annual budget for toilet paper? Yeah, that’ll show ‘em who’s boss.
You gotta love American justice. In the same week that an NYPD officer’s illegal and fatal chokehold was ruled a homicide (incredibly the man who shot the video has now been arrested), JP Morgan gets off with another slap on the wrist. As Glenn Greenwald noted, it’s Liberty and Justice for Some.
For more articles on the trend of harsh and disproportionate punishment for average citizens, yet immunity for banksters and other powerful figures, read:
The “Nanny States of America” – Mother Arrested for Allowing 7-Year-Old Son Walk to Park Alone
Connecticut Man Arrested for “Passive Aggressive” Behavior to a Watermelon
New Jersey Threatens to Take 13-Year-Old Student From His Father Due to “Non-Conforming Behavior”
Hyper-Sensitive Illinois Mayor Orders Police Raid Over Parody Twitter Account
Charleston Man Receives $525 Federal Fine for Failing to Pay for a $0.89 Refill
Video of the Day – Thuggish Militarized Police Terrorize and SWAT Team Iowa Family
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Reblogged this on Spartan of Truth.
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The Criminal Fraud and Theft Commission
or… CFTC for Short
Free markets? This one comes under the heading, “Putting frosting on shit and calling it cake.” Remember Edward Snowden?
The Commodity Futures and Trading Commission was designed to prevent market manipulation. Quite simply, that mission has become so corrupted over the years that the CFTC could be dismantled tomorrow and I doubt anyone would notice. Markets might actually improve. Secondly, we can have no true price discovery of commodities nor can we really even have an intelligent conversation about manipulated pricing because it’s based on a manipulated, “garbage in- garbage out” data stream.
The Commodity Futures and Trading Commission oddly came about in 1974, three short years after President Nixon told France that they could no longer exchange American dollars for physical gold. In so doing, Nixon put the final nail in the coffin for the world’s reserve currency. Nixon then cut a deal with Saudi Arabia and thus OPEC, to price oil in dollars- a move which guaranteed that the rest of the world would have to trade their currencies in for our dollars to buy oil. This was a brilliant move. Everyone would need dollars to buy oil. That move has greatly lengthened the lifespan of the dollar and ushered in the era of the petro dollar. That era continues to this day. Barely.
Thus the CFTC was created to regulate futures markets. Or was it? Personally, I think it was a paper tiger- a commission billed as being a regulatory body to make people feel safer- but in actuality the CFTC has become an interferent presence which allows banks and other trading desks to manipulate markets and thus profit from them. JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs have actually gone years without suffering a single day’s trading losses. It is mathematically impossible to never suffer a loss while trading every day- the only way you can perform that miracle is if you have been given a license to steal.
Please consider the following statement that was issued after the 2008 banking collapse. Up until that point- nobody had ever heard of such a thing.
Since 1991 the CFTC has given secret exemptions from hedging regulations to 19 major banks and market participants, allowing them to accumulate essentially unlimited positions.[21] These exemptions came to light only after the 2008 financial crisis had unfolded and Congress requested information on market participants. A trader or bank granted an exemption as a bona-fide hedger can affect the price of a commodity without being either its producer or consumer.[22
Is it just me or does that sound as though the CFTC in fact- has no regulatory mission at all? It is simply an illusory mechanism which presents itself as some highly regarded regulatory and oversight body (governed by 4 lawyers and 1 banker, who are all from the banking industry) when in fact- it does neither. It’s real mission is to run interference while allowing big trading desks to steal with impunity.
While researching this piece over the weekend, I stumbled onto this…a well researched post regarding the criminal activity that the CFTC engages in while pretending to be regulators. http://news.firedoglake.com/2013/05/17/cftc-caves-to-wall-street-will-continue-to-allow-cartel-to-control-derivatives-market/
I spent all day trying to find the 19 major banks which have been given licenses to steal but in fact, they are not disclosed anywhere. I think it’s a pretty safe bet that banks like Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, and Bank of America are all part of the scam.
Yesterday, I read a piece on Zerohedge http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-08-04/another-settlement-%E2%80%93-jp-morgan-receives-slap-wrist-despite-years-fraudulent-cftc-dat about a fine that JP Morgan had to pay for giving out fraudulent commitment of traders or COT numbers every week. Today I noted a blog on Dave’s site wherein he went into some detail about what a fraudulent scam the COT report is and the fact that all data from all banks is funneled to JPM. Apparently, JP Morgan manipulates that data at will and has been doing so since 2012 or about the time gold started to tank. Here’s Dave’s piece. http://investmentresearchdynamics.com/the-cftc-commitment-of-trader-data-is-rigged-after-all/#comments
It’s one giant, fraudulent, mess and between the CFTC, a banana republic presidential administration which includes that buffoon Eric Holder- it’s as though the rule of law has been suspended at least through 2016.
I don’t expect anything to happen until this administration gets shown the door. I think the full scope of criminal intent will eventually be discovered sometime after Obama and his minions can no longer obstruct an investigation.
I can’t even begin to imagine how many people must know about all of the criminal activity taking place and I’ll be damned if anyone comes forward.
They must have heard about Edward Snowden.
Source: http://thecivillibertarian.blogspot.com/2014/08/the-criminal-fraud-and-theft-commission.html
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JP Morgan Fined – Reporting Fraudulent Large Trader Data
Posted 5 Aug 2014
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Jim Willie: Derivatives Casino Is Wobbling Tower
Posted 5 Aug 2014
Jason Burack of Wall St for Main St had on as a first time guest investor, PhD statistician, former corporate executive and editor of the Hat Trick newsletter for the last 10 years at Golden Jackass http://www.goldenjackass.com/main5.html, Jim Willie.
Jim has had a very long list of accurate predictions come true in the long term in financial markets since he started writing his newsletters including correctly predicting bank failures, zero interest rate policy (ZIRP), and many more.
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