Ranchers Dismiss CME Protection Fund as Chickenfeed to Cattlemen
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Pete Bonds, a 59-year-old Texas rancher, doffed his cowboy hat and stepped to the microphone. He wanted to tell an executive from CME Group Inc., owner of the world’s largest futures market, what he thought of the $100 million fund set up to help protect ranchers and farmers from a collapse like that of commodities broker MF Global Holdings Ltd.
To Bonds and other members of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association gathered in Nashville on Feb. 3, the protection fund that CME Chief Operating Officer Bryan Durkin was there promoting amounted to little more than a pile of chickenfeed.