London, 24 February 2010

The base and precious metals markets, which have thus far avoided becoming a focus of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission's  tougher approach to regulation, will be the subject of a meeting next month.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Chairman Gary Gensler has announced that the agency will hold a public meeting on March 25, 2010, to examine the trading of futures and options in the precious and base metals markets.

The meeting will be open to the public and will be webcast via the Internet. In addition, audio of the meeting will be available via a listen-only conference call.

“This month’s meeting will be part of our ongoing look into how the Commission regulates futures and options markets on commodities of finite supply,” Chairman Gensler said. “Our July and August hearings on energy futures and options markets were very informative. We look forward to again hearing from interested members of the public on the important metals markets.”

The meeting participants and a call-in information will be announced in the coming weeks.

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