President Trump will ask the Senate to confirm J. Christopher Giancarlo as chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the White House announced. Giancarlo was named acting chairman on the day Trump took office and is expected to rein in Dodd-Frank financial reforms.
Giancarlo, a commissioner since June 2014, would succeed Timothy Massad, a Democrat, who resigned with the change in administration. Sharon Brown is the only other commissioner at present. The overseer of the futures industry, the CFTC is at full strength with five commissioners.
Since the start of the year, Giancarlo was regarded as the front runner for CFTC chairman, according to Bloomberg. He was the only Republican on the commission at that time. “Trump’s CFTC chairman is expected to play a pivotal role in rolling back some rules dictated by the Dodd-Frank Act, which called for broad government oversight of swaps after unregulated trades helped fuel the 2008 financial crisis. Giancarlo has argued that in some areas the CFTC went further than lawmakers intended,” said Bloomberg in January. “Trump’s transition team has promised to dismantle Dodd-Frank.”