Comment Text:
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From:
Sent:
To:
Subject:
j [email protected]
Tuesday, April
13, 2010 9:53 PM
secretary
Proposed Speculative Position Limits on Energy
Jeffrey T. Geyer
250 Park Road
Aliquippa, PA 15001-5930
April 13, 2010
David Stawick
Secretary, Commodity Futures Trading Commission
Three Lafayette Centre
1155 21st Street, NW
Washington, DC 20581
Dear Mr. Stawick:
I am writing in support of the CFTC's Proposed Federal Speculative
Position Limits that will reestablish speculative position limits on maj or
energy commodities. This rule will provide stability to the marketplace
and help prevent future price bubbles. The CFTC must quickly approve a
strong rule to protect America's struggling economy. Wall Street's
speculative trading in oil not only hurts the economy, but hurts every
American who pays excessive prices at the pump, for groceries, home
heating oil and everything related to transportation.
Our tax dollars were used to bail out large Wall Street firms when they
were on the brink of bankruptcy. It is these same institutions that
pushed the price of gasoline well past $4 per gallon in 2008 by gambling
on oil and continue to profit at every American's expense.
Rampant oil speculation by large Wall Street trading firms has resulted in
extreme volatility in energy markets and unwarranted price spikes in
recent years. Given that supplies are at record highs and demand remains
weak, fundamentals cannot explain recent price hikes and destructive price
swings. Unless the CFTC adopts the proposed rule, markets will continue to
fluctuate wildly.
Position limits existed in energy markets until 2001 and currently apply
to agricultural commodities. CFTC should use its existing experience to
regulate position limits of speculators and prevent excessive
concentration in the energy markets, while ensuring that exemptions to
these limits afforded to real physical players such as fuel cooperatives,
public utilities, truckers and airlines are not exploited by big banks and
billionaire investors.
Energy consumers desperately need stability in the marketplace. I
encourage the CFTC to adopt the Proposed Federal Speculative Position
Limits before volatile fuel prices further harm the country's already10-002
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weakened economy.
Now a personal note. I believe that not only our economy but our nation
runs on resonably priced energy. The price of energy impacts VERY aspect
of our lives. Not only by how much it costs to heat our homes or drive
our cars, but in the price of the food we eat to the price of educating
our children.
It would be understandable (although not easy to accept) if the price of
energy were to again rise substantially. But this time due to supply and
demand forces or cost of exploration and development. Or even to
supplement the development or implementation of alternative energys and/or
sources of energy.
But these price escalations were for the opposite. To fuel the profit
margins of banks and spculators. Thier activities, in my opinion,
brought forth to some extent the recession we are currently experiencing.
With the sharp increase in energy prices and the "snowball effect"
associated with it, consumer spending colapsed. Money that would have
gone for other expenditures, both necessary and leasure, dropped. Money
that would have gone to pay bills or college tuition or vacationing had to
go into the gas tank, the electric bill and the heating bill.
Even after the prices started coming down people refused to start
spending. Mainly out of fear that the energy prices would again
escalate. As proof, you could see consumer spending has been down for the
last year. As the painfull memory of $4.00 a gallon gasoline is starting
to fade and a feeling of a more stable market people started to relax
their spending rstrictions.
Now as gasoline is starting to rise again you will see a constraint on
spending. Peoples incomes are not going up but our costs are, the economy
is still slugish. We will not see the economic activity that we need
until we all feel energy prices have returned to the price levels that
they should be.
Oil producing nations are pumping oil, even the much dislike OPEC nations
are trying to stablize the market. They set reasonable production limits
and then even allowing excess production.
We NEED to control and minimize Oil Speculation. We NEED to do this if we
expect our nation to return to the vibrant economic powerhouse it once
was. We as a nation, once again were taught lesson about energy. We were
taught this lesson in the 70's, thirty some years ago. Unfortunately we
have lost sight of the lessons learned. This time though, I think we will
take these lesson further than we did previously.
We can not achieve our goals of energy indpendence if we are forced to pay
high prices for energy only due to escalations cause by what is simply
greed.
Please inact these restrictions. Please help place America back on track.
Please do what I feel is the right thing by restricting speculation.
Thank you!!Sincerely,
Jeffrey T. Geyer
7243788989
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