"A good parson once said that where mystery begins, religion ends. Cannot I say, as truly at least,
of human laws, that where mystery begins, justice ends?"
Edmund Burke
Jill Sommers, the CFTC Commissioner who is leading the investigation into the MF Global bankruptcy gave some important testimony to the House today that has been overshadowed by the expected appearance of Jon Corzine.
If you have been following the case, you know that JP Morgan has taken the lead in attempting to file motions to subordinate the customer accounts to their own debts. There is also a motion being heard that the Trustee has a conflict of interest with their fiduciary responsibilities as Trustee and a long standing relationship with JPM.
There are also some confusing arguments being made that because some of the activity was conducted in a subsidiary in London, the UK rules apply to the customer funds. Some of them sound like they are being crafted by the Wall Street attorneys who will be defending and justifying the theft of customer funds. Be careful of some of the 'news' that you get from the corporate media.
As Sommers later made clear, and as Janet Tavakoli encapsulates so well,
"Jill Sommers did a great job with her testimony leaving no room for doubt that 1) the cases in which investment in foreign sovereign debt for customers’ own accounts are limited to the extent of their foreign exchange deposits (so a small minority of accounts) and 2) it is never allowable to transfer money out of the customer accounts to commingle with MF’s investments."
Here is Jill Sommers testimony before the House today.
"When a broker-dealer is also a registered FCM, as MF Global was, there is one dually-registered entity and the entire entity gets placed into liquidation. Because there is one entity, it is not possible to initiate a SIPA liquidation of the broker-dealer, and a separate bankruptcy proceeding for the FCM. It is important to note, however, that when a dually-registered BD/FCM is placed into a SIPA liquidation proceeding, the relevant provisions and protections of the Bankruptcy Code, the Commodity Exchange Act (“CEA”), and the Commission’s regulations apply to customer commodity accounts just as they would if the entity were solely an FCM and in a non-SIPA bankruptcy proceeding.
An obvious point to make is that if a firm is involved in a bankruptcy proceeding, something must have gone very wrong. Bankruptcy proceedings can be very complicated and at times, messy. This can be magnified when the bankruptcy is among the largest in history and there are serious questions about the location of customer funds. The Commission is no stranger to FCM bankruptcies. Lehman Brothers and Refco are the two most recent FCM bankruptcies. While the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy was monumental in scale, and the Refco bankruptcy involved serious fraud at the parent company, commodity customers did not lose their money at either firm. In both instances, commodity customer accounts were wholly intact, that is, they contained all open positions and all associated segregated collateral. That being the case, customer accounts were promptly transferred to healthy FCMs, with the commodity customers having no further involvement in the bankruptcy proceeding. Unfortunately that is not what happened at MF Global because customer accounts were not intact.
In FCM bankruptcies, commodity customers have, pursuant to Section 766(h) of the Bankruptcy Code, priority in customer property. This includes, without limitation, segregated property, property that was illegally removed from segregation and is still within the debtor’s estate, and property that was illegally removed from segregation and is no longer within in the debtor’s estate, but is clawed-back into the debtor’s estate by the Trustee. If the customer property as I just described is insufficient to satisfy in full all the claims of customers, Part 190 of the Commission’s regulations allow other property of the debtor’s estate to be classified as customer property to make up any shortfall. A parent or affiliated entity, however, generally would not be a “debtor” unless customer funds could be traced to that entity.
Within the first weeks of the MF Global bankruptcy, the Trustee for the BD/FCM had, with the encouragement and assistance of the CFTC, transferred nearly all positions of customers trading on U.S. commodity futures markets, and transferred approximately $2 billion of customer property. On November 29th, the Trustee moved to transfer an additional $2.1 billion back to customers, to be used to “top up” all commodity customers to at least two-thirds of their account values as reflected on the books and records of MF Global, Inc. The Bankruptcy Court will hear the motion on December 9th. If the Court grants the motion we expect the transfer may be complete in two to four weeks, given the Trustee’s estimate of the timeframe within which he can complete the administrative functions necessary to effectuate the transfer. These transfers demonstrate that commodity customers are indeed receiving the highest priority in claims to customer property. We understand that more must be done...
While an FCM is permitted to invest customer funds, it is important to note that if an FCM does so, the value of the customer segregated account must remain intact at all times. In other words, when an FCM invests customer funds, that actual investment, or collateral equal in value to the investment, must remain in the customer segregated account at all times. If customer funds are transferred out of the segregated account to be invested by the FCM, the FCM must make a simultaneous transfer of assets into the segregated account. An FCM cannot take money out of a segregated account, invest it, and then return the money to the segregated account at some later time."
I expect that at some point the CFTC will file civil charges and will settle.
What the Obama Justice Department does about any criminal charges will be a significant indication of its character. I think the character of the opposition party is abundantly clear.
I believe that the US based customers will be made whole. I cannot speak for any customers who may have been served by MF's overseas subsidiaries, particularly the UK. I just do not know enough about jurisdictions and the scope of the bankruptcy in the US court.
But I think I can spot disinformation, propaganda, bold injustice, and brazen theft when I see it, given enough time and effort.
