Market manipulation -- the exercise of market power in a future market- is a felony under US commodity law, but recent court and regulatory decisions have made conviction of a manipulator problematic at best. Instead, regulators attempt to prevent manupulation through verious means. Deterrence...

In a Walres-debreu world, all relevant attributes of all traded commodities are completely and costlessly specified, information is symmetric and costless, and all contracts ate costlessly enforced. In the real world in which trade takes place, it is costly to specify and verify commodity...