FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 24, 2014  

Hudson Votes to Provide Certainty to Consumers and Job Creators

WASHINGTON, DC - Today, U.S. Representative Richard Hudson (NC-08) released the following statement after voting in favor of H.R. 4413—The Consumer Protection and End User Relief Act. This legislation includes the full language of H.R. 3814—The Risk Management Certainty Act—which was introduced by Rep. Hudson in January.

To view Rep. Hudson speak on the House Floor in support of this legislation, please click here.

“In today’s world where the cost of living continues to rise for millions of American families, we cannot afford for our nation’s job creators and energy providers to bear the brunt of yet another regulatory burden without a full and fair debate and vote,” said Hudson. “This bill solves that problem by requiring CFTC Commissioners to partake in a formal rulemaking process to give the public the ability to weigh in before a decision is made. I am proud to support this legislation to provide American consumers and job creators the certainty to know they will not be arbitrarily burdened by undue regulations.”

Background:

The Risk Management Certainty Act is measured legislation that would simply require the CFTC Commissioners to vote on whether dozens of end-users would have to register with the Commission in the coming years as “swap dealers” while preserving the current registration thresholds established by the CFTC in May of 2012.

·         Without this legislation, a misguided CFTC rule will automatically lump costly new regulations on public utilities, energy companies, and other end-users that played no part in the financial crisis.  

·         As the regulations currently stand, if a company does more than $8 billion worth of swap business per year (known as the de minimis level of swap dealing), it must register with the CFTC as a “swap dealer.”

·         The CFTC’s regulations will arbitrarily lower the registration threshold to $3 billion starting five years from October of 2012 (and possibly sooner) with no Commission vote, despite rules requiring a Commission “study” to determine if the swap dealer registration threshold is appropriately set at $8 billion.  

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