Michael Selig said the CFTC Enforcement Division oil inquiry has been examining oil trading during the Iran war, including a March 23 burst that involved futures tied to Brent and West Texas Intermediate. The two-minute selling reached at least 6 million barrels of crude and drew scrutiny because it came before Donald Trump backed away from threats to strike Iranian power plants.
On Friday, Selig said, “Our enforcement division has been looking at all these trades,” and added, “We take this stuff very seriously.” He also said, “We are on top of this and, rest assured, people can have confidence in the markets as long as I’m in the seat.”
March 23 trading surge
The March 23 activity was unusually large even by the market’s own recent trading pattern. Volume in the two-minute window was more than 8.5 times the amount recorded during the same period in the prior week.
That timing is what raised the sharpest questions. The trades came while oil markets were sensitive to presidential announcements during the Iran war, and the sequence left open the possibility that some traders knew more than the wider market did before Trump changed course.
Michael Selig on Friday
Selig did not identify any traders involved in the activity. He also did not say whether investigators had found wrongdoing, and the CFTC has not announced any enforcement findings.
The inquiry now hinges on what the enforcement division finds in the trade records themselves: whether the March 23 burst was ordinary market activity or whether it reflected advance knowledge of a coming policy shift. For traders, the practical result is continued scrutiny of oil positions linked to Brent and West Texas Intermediate while the regulator keeps reviewing the trades.
Trump and market timing
previously reported several spikes in oil trading volumes ahead of major Trump announcements this spring. Selig’s remarks add a public timeline to that pattern, but they stop short of any enforcement conclusion.
The same remarks also showed the CFTC was watching prediction markets for possible manipulation ahead of November's midterm elections, extending the agency’s focus beyond crude and into another market where timing can shape price moves.
