“The House committee vote to slash funding for the CFTC is indefensible. It puts American taxpayers at risk of another financial meltdown from the too-big-to fail Wall Street firms that caused the last crisis. Wall Street is a high crime area and the CFTC is a front-line cop on the Wall Street beat,” said Dennis Kelleher, President and CEO of Better Markets, a nonprofit organization that promotes the public interest in the financial markets.

“No one can claim to be for financial reform or for protecting Main Street and be against full funding of the CFTC,” Mr. Kelleher said.

“The last crisis will cost our country more than $12.8 trillion. It was invisibly incubated and transmitted in the derivatives markets. The CFTC has the responsibility of making sure that does not happen again. That requires substantially increased resources. If they are not provided, people are setting the CFTC up for failure and failing the American people, who have already suffered too much from an unregulated Wall Street,” Mr. Kelleher concluded.

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Better Markets is an independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that promotes the public interest in financial reform in the domestic and global capital and commodity markets. Better Markets advocates for transparency, oversight and accountability with the goal of a stronger, safer financial system that is less prone to crisis and failure thereby eliminating or minimizing the need for more taxpayer funded bailouts.