CFR Subpart C

CFR Subpart C
in effect

17 C.F.R. § 38.150 Core Principle 2.

(a) In general. The board of trade shall establish, monitor, and enforce compliance with the rules of the contract market, including: (1) Access requirements; (2) The terms and conditions of any contracts to be traded on the contract market; and (3) Rules prohibiting abusive trade practices on the contract market. (b) Capacity of contract market. The board of trade shall have the capacity to detect, investigate, and apply appropriate sanctions to any person that violates any rule of the contract market. (c) Requirement of rules. The rules of the contract market shall provide the board of trade with the ability and authority to obtain any necessary information to perform any function described in this section, including the capacity to carry out such international information-sharing agreements, as the Commission may require.

17 C.F.R. § 38.151 Access requirements.

(a) Jurisdiction. Prior to granting any member or market participant access to its markets, a designated contract market must require that the member or market participant consent to its jurisdiction. (b) Impartial access by members, persons with trading privileges and independent software vendors. A designated contract market must provide its members, persons with trading privileges, and independent software vendors with impartial access to its markets and services, including: (1) Access criteria that are impartial, transparent, and applied in a non-discriminatory manner; and (2) Comparable fee structures for members, persons with trading privileges and independent software vendors receiving equal access to, or services from, the designated contract market. (c) Limitations on access. A designated contract market must establish and impartially enforce rules governing denials, suspensions, and revocations of a member's and a person with trading privileges' access privileges to the designated contract market, including when such actions are part of a disciplinary or emergency action by the designated contract market.

17 C.F.R. § 38.152 Abusive trading practices prohibited.

A designated contract market must prohibit abusive trading practices on its markets by members and market participants. Designated contract markets that permit intermediation must prohibit customer-related abuses including, but not limited to, trading ahead of customer orders, trading against customer orders, accommodation trading, and improper cross trading. Specific trading practices that must be prohibited by all designated contract markets include front-running, wash trading, pre-arranged trading (except for certain transactions specifically permitted under part 38 of this chapter), fraudulent trading, money passes, and any other trading practices that a designated contract market deems to be abusive. In addition, a designated contract market also must prohibit any other manipulative or disruptive trading practices prohibited by the Act or by the Commission pursuant to Commission regulation.

17 C.F.R. § 38.153 Capacity to detect and investigate rule violations.

A designated contract market must have arrangements and resources for effective enforcement of its rules. Such arrangements must include the authority to collect information and documents on both a routine and non-routine basis, including the authority to examine books and records kept by the designated contract market's members and by persons under investigation. A designated contract market's arrangements and resources must also facilitate the direct supervision of the market and the analysis of data collected to determine whether a rule violation occurred.

17 C.F.R. § 38.154 Regulatory services provided by a third party.

(a) Use of third-party provider permitted. A designated contract market may choose to utilize a registered futures association or another registered entity, as such terms are defined under the Act, (collectively, “regulatory service provider”), for the provision of services to assist in complying with the core principles, as approved by the Commission. Any designated contract market that chooses to utilize a regulatory service provider must ensure that its regulatory service provider has the capacity and resources necessary to provide timely and effective regulatory services, including adequate staff and automated surveillance systems. A designated contract market will at all times remain responsible for the performance of any regulatory services received, for compliance with the designated contract market's obligations under the Act and Commission regulations, and for the regulatory service provider's performance on its behalf. (b) Duty to supervise third party. A designated contract market that elects to utilize a regulatory service provider must retain sufficient compliance staff to supervise the quality and effectiveness of the services provided on its behalf. Compliance staff of the designated contract market must hold regular meetings with the regulatory service provider to discuss ongoing investigations, trading patterns, market participants, and any other matters of regulatory concern. A designated contract market also must conduct periodic reviews of the adequacy and effectiveness of services provided on its behalf. Such reviews must be documented carefully and made available to the Commission upon request. (c) Regulatory decisions required from the designated contract market. A designated contract market that elects to utilize a regulatory service provider must retain exclusive authority in decisions involving the cancellation of trades, the issuance of disciplinary charges against members or market participants, and the denials of access to the trading platform for disciplinary reasons. A designated contract market may also retain exclusive authority in other areas of its choosing. A designated contract market must document any instances where its actions differ from those recommended by its regulatory service provider, including the reasons for the course of action recommended by the regulatory service provider and the reasons why the designated contract market chose a different course of action.

17 C.F.R. § 38.155 Compliance staff and resources.

(a) Sufficient compliance staff. A designated contract market must establish and maintain sufficient compliance department resources and staff to ensure that it can conduct effective audit trail reviews, trade practice surveillance, market surveillance, and real-time market monitoring. The designated contract market's compliance staff also must be sufficient to address unusual market or trading events as they arise, and to conduct and complete investigations in a timely manner, as set forth in § 38.158(b) of this part. (b) Ongoing monitoring of compliance staff resources. A designated contract market must monitor the size and workload of its compliance staff annually, and ensure that its compliance resources and staff are at appropriate levels. In determining the appropriate level of compliance resources and staff, the designated contract market should consider trading volume increases, the number of new products or contracts to be listed for trading, any new responsibilities to be assigned to compliance staff, the results of any internal review demonstrating that work is not completed in an effective or timely manner, and any other factors suggesting the need for increased resources and staff.

17 C.F.R. § 38.156 Automated trade surveillance system.

A designated contract market must maintain an automated trade surveillance system capable of detecting and investigating potential trade practice violations. The automated system must load and process daily orders and trades no later than 24 hours after the completion of the trading day. In addition, the automated trade surveillance system must have the capability to detect and flag specific trade execution patterns and trade anomalies; compute, retain, and compare trading statistics; compute trade gains, losses, and futures-equivalent positions; reconstruct the sequence of market activity; perform market analyses; and support system users to perform in-depth analyses and ad hoc queries of trade-related data.

17 C.F.R. § 38.157 Real-time market monitoring.

A designated contract market must conduct real-time market monitoring of all trading activity on its electronic trading platform(s) to identify disorderly trading and any market or system anomalies. A designated contract market must have the authority to adjust trade prices or cancel trades when necessary to mitigate market disrupting events caused by malfunctions in its electronic trading platform(s) or errors in orders submitted by members and market participants. Any trade price adjustments or trade cancellations must be transparent to the market and subject to standards that are clear, fair, and publicly available.

17 C.F.R. § 38.158 Investigations and investigation reports.

(a) Procedures. A designated contract market must establish and maintain procedures that require its compliance staff to conduct investigations of possible rule violations. An investigation must be commenced upon the receipt of a request from Commission staff or upon the discovery or receipt of information by the designated contract market that indicates a reasonable basis for finding that a violation may have occurred or will occur. (b) Timeliness. Each compliance staff investigation must be completed in a timely manner. Absent mitigating factors, a timely manner is no later than 12 months after the date that an investigation is opened. Mitigating factors that may reasonably justify an investigation taking longer than 12 months to complete include the complexity of the investigation, the number of firms or individuals involved as potential wrongdoers, the number of potential violations to be investigated, and the volume of documents and data to be examined and analyzed by compliance staff. (c) Investigation reports when a reasonable basis exists for finding a violation. Compliance staff must submit a written investigation report for disciplinary action in every instance in which compliance staff determines from surveillance or from an investigation that a reasonable basis exists for finding a rule violation. The investigation report must include the reason the investigation was initiated; a summary of the complaint, if any; the relevant facts; compliance staff's analysis and conclusions; and a recommendation as to whether disciplinary action should be pursued. (d) Investigation reports when no reasonable basis exists for finding a violation. If after conducting an investigation, compliance staff determines that no reasonable basis exists for finding a violation, it must prepare a written report including the reason(s) the investigation was initiated; a summary of the complaint, if any; the relevant facts; and compliance staff's analysis and conclusions. (e) Warning letters. No more than one warning letter may be issued to the same person or entity found to have committed the same rule violation within a rolling twelve month period.

17 C.F.R. § 38.159 Ability to obtain information.

A designated contract market must have the ability and authority to obtain any necessary information to perform any function required under this subpart C of the Commission's regulations, including the capacity to carry out international information-sharing agreements as the Commission may require. Appropriate information-sharing agreements can be established with other designated contract markets and swap execution facilities, or the Commission can act in conjunction with the designated contract market to carry out such information sharing.

17 C.F.R. § 38.160 Additional sources for compliance.

Applicants and designated contract markets may refer to the guidance in appendix B of this part to demonstrate to the Commission compliance with the requirements of § 38.150 of this part.

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