Caroline D. Pham has a short list of things the Commodity Futures Trading Commission cannot regulate. It includes onions and movie box office receipts.
Almost everything else, she argues, falls under the agency’s reach. That includes digital assets, and she says it works without Congress passing a new law.
In an interview on October 12, 2026, the former acting chairman of the CFTC said the Commodity Exchange Act gives the agency jurisdiction over virtually every commodity. She also backed the agency’s recent crypto proposals. Pham called them “absolutely the kind of protection” that US retail crypto traders need.
The CFTC is in the middle of writing rules for how everyday Americans trade crypto, including with borrowed money.
The onion exception
Pham’s argument rests on the Commodity Exchange Act, or CEA. That law is the CFTC’s founding rulebook.
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Her reading is broad. In her view, the statute covers almost all commodities, with onions and movie box office receipts carved out. If something isn’t on that very short exclusion list, the CFTC can oversee it.
What the CFTC has actually proposed
The agency issued an advanced notice of proposed rulemaking around October 5, 2026. It focuses on retail commodity transactions in crypto assets.
An advanced notice is an early step in the rulemaking process. The agency floats ideas and asks the public for feedback before drafting a formal rule. Nothing binding exists yet.
Current CFTC Chairman Michael Selig is pushing frameworks for retail digital asset transactions. These include margined and leveraged trading.
Pham pointed to these proposals as the right kind of guardrails for retail traders.
In December 2025, the CFTC launched a digital assets pilot program that used BTC, ETH, and USDC as tokenized collateral in derivatives markets.
Pham’s tenure and the enforcement question
Pham joined the CFTC as a commissioner in April 2022. She served as acting chairman from January 20, 2025, until she left the agency on December 22, 2025.
The December 2025 pilot program launched in the final stretch of her time as acting chairman. The October 2026 proposals came after her departure, under Selig.
Her tenure also coincided with a sharp change in how the agency polices markets. CFTC enforcement actions fell nearly 80% in 2025 compared with the average of the prior decade.
That drop came alongside a 21% staffing reduction by year-end. The agency also shifted strategy, moving away from certain crypto cases.
Disclosure: This article was edited by John Chen. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.