BURLINGTON, Vt., Sept. 28 – U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) issued
the following statement today after a federal judge struck down a Commodity
Futures Trading Commission rule on market speculation:

“Today’s court decision is another victory for Wall Street speculators who have been given a green light to rip off the American people at the gas pump.  The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act clearly required the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to impose strict limits on oil and gasoline trading to eliminate, prevent, or diminish excessive oil speculation.  Sadly, one judge has disagreed and is preventing even the weakest rules on oil speculation limits to go into effect.  This is wrong, and I hope the CFTC will appeal this decision.

“Even Goldman Sachs, perhaps the largest oil speculator on Wall Street, has indicated that speculators are driving up gasoline prices by some 56 cents a gallon at the pump.  I will continue to do everything I can to eliminate excessive oil speculation to make sure that the price of gasoline and heating oil are based on the fundamentals of supply and demand – not Wall Street greed.”