§16a Service fees and National Futures Association study

Summary

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission can create and run a plan to charge reasonable fees to cover the estimated cost of regulating the transactions it oversees. Before starting the plan, the Commission must tell the House Committee on Agriculture and the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry and explain whether the fees are feasible and desirable. The plan cannot begin until those two committees approve it. Fees collected under any approved plan must be deposited in the Treasury of the United States as miscellaneous receipts. The Commission must also send Congress a report with the results of a study of the National Futures Association’s regulatory work from January 1, 1983 through September 30, 1985. That report is due not later than January 1, 1986. It must cover the NFA’s implementation and effectiveness, actual and projected cost savings to the Federal Government, actual and projected costs the Commission and the public would have faced without NFA self-regulation, any problems, the NFA–Commission relationship, actual and projected efficiencies for the Commission, and the Commission’s ability to focus on other regulatory issues. The Commission still has the authority, after notice and a hearing, to set fees for its services under the Commodity Exchange Act, but any fee cannot exceed the Commission’s actual cost.