USCA4 Appeal: 25-1892
Doc: 16
Filed: 10/15/2025
Pg: 22 of 97
Congress responded in 1974 with seminal legislation designed to “[b]ring [] all futures trading under federal regulation.” Hearings Before the S. Comm. on Agric. & Forestry, 93d Cong. 848 (1974) [hereinafter “ Senate Hearings ”] . Most relevant here, Congress created the CFTC to oversee trading on DCMs. Congress recognized that federal regulation would only be workable if it “prevent[ed] any possible conflict s over jurisdiction.” House Hearings at 128. Congress in Section 2(a) of the amended statute therefore
explicitly vested the CFTC with “exclusive jurisdiction” over trading on
DCMs. 7 U.S.C. § 2(a)(1)(A).
Congress also deliberately reinforced the CFTC ’s exclusive jurisdiction
in two respects. First, after House drafters introduced a state-law savings
clause, the Senate added language making clear that the clause applied
“except as hereinabove provided” in the grant of exclusive jurisdiction to the
CFTC. S. Rep. No. 93-1131, at 31 (1974). The language ensured that “the
Commission’s jurisdiction, where applicable , supersedes State as well as Federal agencies.” Id . at 6. Second, the Senate “struck” the existing
provision preserving “any State law applicable” to derivatives transactions.
H.R. Rep. No. 93-1383, at 35 (quotation marks omitted). As the conference
report explained, the amendments were designed to “preempt the field
Id . Congress did “ not
insofar as futures regulation is concerned.”
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