WASHINGTON, Jan. 25- The House Committee on Agriculture approved six bills designed to amend Title VII of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act.
The committee has held seven hearings in the past year regarding the implementation of Title VII, gathering testimony from almost 40 witnesses.
“The feedback we heard was fairly consistent—across the country farmers, ranchers, community banks and Main Street businesses are worried about the unintended consequences of Dodd-Frank rules,” said House Agriculture Committee Chairman Frank Lucas.
“Some of these regulations could make using derivatives so expensive that businesses will be forced to stop using them to hedge against risk,” he said. “That increases costs for consumers, and reduces stability in the market place. That is completely contrary to the intent of the original Dodd-Frank legislation.”
However, Ranking Member Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) suggested patience with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and cautioned changing the law. Peterson said that his frequent talks with Chairman Gensler of the CFTC assure him that many of the bills the Committee considered are not necessary.
“The CFTC is going to get this right,” he said. “To date, most of the final rules coming out of the Commission have bipartisan support and are addressing the concerns that stakeholders have expressed to both us and the Commission.”
“The sad part of this exercise is that we may find out later it wasn’t even necessary,” Peterson added. “What is potentially even sadder is that even if we do find that any of these bills are necessary, they have no future. The majority of Senate Republicans and their leadership have dedicated themselves to the repeal of Dodd-Frank.”
The Committee passed by voice vote each of the six bills considered in today’s business meeting, with some additional amendments.
H.R. 1840, to improve consideration by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission of the costs and benefits of its regulations and orders.
H.R. 2682, Business Mitigation and Price Stabilization Act of 2011
H.R. 2682 Amendment in the Nature of a Substitution
H.R. 2779, to exempt inter-affiliate swaps from certain regulatory requirements put in place by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act.
H.R. 2779 Amendment in the Nature of a Substitution
H.R. 2586, Swap Execution Facility (SEF) Clarification Act
H.R. 2586 Amendment in the Nature of a Substitution
H.R. 3336, Small Business Credit Availability Act
H.R. 3336 Amendment in the Nature of a Substitution
H.R. 3527, Protecting Main Street End-Users from Excessive Regulation
H.R. 3527 Amendment in the Nature of a Substitution
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