CFTC Staff Letters Archive

CFTC Staff Letters Archive provides Letters from 2007 and earlier. For Letters published 2008 or later visit the All Letters page.

There are no Advisory Letters or Other Written Communications for 2007 or earlier.

Date	PDF and Description
09/26/2006	06-26 ; Rules 4.21, 4.22 and 4.23 – CPO disclosure, recordkeeping and reporting requirements;; No-Action The Division of Clearing and Intermediary Oversight granted exemptive relief from certain of the Part 4 regulations to the registered CPO of a commodity pool, whose shares the CPO intended to publicly offer and to list for trading on a national securities exchange. As is discussed in the letter, this relief was in the nature of substituted compliance with those regulations.
09/26/2006	06-22 ; Sections 2(a);; No-Action Hong Kong Futures Exchange Limited’s Request for No-Action Relief in Connection with the Offer and Sale in the United States of its Futures Contracts Based on the FTSE/Xinhua China 25 Index and the Hang Seng China Enterprises Index.
09/22/2006	06-21 ; Sections 5 and 5a of the Act;; No-Action The Division of Market Oversight issued a letter amending the no-action relief granted December 17, 1999, to the Singapore International Monetary Exchange Limited (SIMEX), now the Singapore Exchange Derivatives Trading Ltd (SGX), permitting SIMEX to make its electronic trading and order matching system, SIMEX ETS, available to members in the U.S. without obtaining contract market designation pursuant to Sections 5 and 5a of the CEA. The amendment, among other things, acknowledges the reorganization of exchanges in Singapore, recognizes that SGX QUEST has replaced SIMEX ETS as the trading engine on SGX for financial futures and options on futures contracts, and extends the relief to the Joint Asian Derivatives Exchange (JADE), a joint venture of SGX and CBOT Holdings Inc. that operates as a division of SGX. The CBOT’s electronic trading and order matching system known as the e-cbot trading platform powered by LIFFE CONNECT (e-cbot System) is the trading engine for the JADE market, which lists futures and options on futures contracts on physical commodities based in Asia. The amendment also extends the no-action relief to include non-registration as a derivatives transaction execution facility pursuant to Section 5a of the CEA.
09/07/2006	06-20 ; Sections 4d, 4f, 4g, 4k and 4p of the CEAct and Parts 1, 30 and 180;; No-Action The Division of Clearing and Intermediary Oversight extended relief previously granted (Staff Letter 02-22) to permit institutional customers to trade certain proprietary electronically-traded broad-based-index futures contracts (the contracts) in a securities account with a registered broker-dealer notice-registered as a limited-purpose FCM (for purposes of accepting and executing orders for the contracts). The relief consisted of substitution of compliance with applicable securities law regulatory requirements for compliance with various otherwise applicable requirements under the CEAct and Commissions rules.
09/06/2006	06-19 ; CEAct Section 4a, Regulation 150.2;; No-Action The Division of Market Oversight has issued a no-action letter regarding speculative position limits. A registered commodity pool operator and commodity trading advisor offers to the public investments in a proprietary commodity investment program based on an index of a diversified group of various physical commodities, including wheat, soybeans and corn. The program maintains offsetting long futures positions in the commodities that make up the index. If the program reaches a certain size, its positions in wheat, soybeans and corn futures will exceed the speculative position limits for those commodities set out in Commission Regulation 150.2. The letter states that, subject to certain conditions, the Division will not recommend that enforcement action be taken with respect to the position limits being exceeded. The conditions include: that the futures trading activity passively tracks the program’s strategy; that the program’s strategy continues to reflect a broadly diversified basket of tangible commodities, calculated and rebalanced based on an objective, predetermined mathematical formula, as described in the no-action request; that the futures trading activity is unleveraged; that the futures trading activity does not result in price exposure for the program’s sponsor/offeror (i.e., price exposure is passed on to the investors); and that positions in excess of the speculative limits are not carried into the spot month.
08/24/2006	06-18 ; Section 2(a);; No-Action Mercado Mexicano de Derivados, S.A. de C.V.’s request for no-action relief in connection with the offer and sale in the United States of its futures contract based on the Mexican Stock Exchange’s Price and Quotation Index.
08/08/2006	06-17 ; Section 2(a);; No-Action No-Action request to permit the offer and sale in the United States of the Sydney Futures Exchange Corporation Limited’s 1-Day Option Contract based on the CBOT Mini-Sized Dow futures Contract.
07/12/2006	06-15 ; Rules 4.21, 4.22 and 4.23;; No-Action The Division of Clearing and Intermediary Oversight granted exemptive relief from certain of the Part 4 regulations to the registered CPO of a commodity pool, whose shares the CPO intended to publicly offer and to list for trading on a national securities exchange. As is discussed in the letter, this relief was in the nature of substituted compliance with those regulations.
07/10/2006	06-14 ; Section 2(a);; No-Action Osaka Securities Exchange Co. Ltd.’s request for no-action relief in connection with the offer and sale in the United States of its Mini Futures Contract based on the Nikkei 225 Stock Average Index.
07/07/2006	06-16 ; Rules 4.21, 4.22 and 4.23;; No-Action The Division of Clearing and Intermediary Oversight granted exemptive relief from certain of the Part 4 regulations to the registered CPO of a commodity pool, whose shares the CPO intended to publicly offer and to list for trading on a national securities exchange. As is discussed in the letter, this relief was in the nature of substituted compliance with those regulations.