As oil prices staged a spectacular collapse from $145 a barrel (remember peak oil?) to the $30 range, it’s hard to believe speculation played no role in skyrocketing prices. Even though oil prices have plummeted, Congress is preparing to increase regulation in the commodity markets.
As Oil Sinks, U.S. Officials Plan to Fight Speculation 
By Gregory Meyer and Ian Talley, WSJ
Excerpt: A financial crisis and recession this year have pulled off what U.S. lawmakers couldn’t: popping what many believe was a speculative bubble in oil prices.
But a collapse from highs above $145 a barrel into the $30 range doesn’t mean Congress is washing its hands of the issue. Instead, many lawmakers are emboldened, seeing both the crude-price collapse and the systemic failure of the credit-derivatives market as reason to push ahead with rules to prevent what they call "excessive speculation" in commodity markets.
"The anti-speculation talk may have subsided in the market slide, but its ugly head is likely to rise again," said Greg Mocek, a former head of enforcement at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, now a partner at law firm McDermott, Will & Emery in Washington.
Light, sweet crude oil for January delivery on Friday fell $2.35 a barrel, or 6.5%, to $33.87 on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The new benchmark contract, which ended higher on Friday, is poised to begin trading above $40.
President-elect Barack Obama vowed Thursday to impose more stringent regulation of financial, stock and commodity markets. In his nomination of Gary Gensler as CFTC chairman, Mr. Obama charged his appointee with "regulating some of the unsound practices and excessive leverage that helped cause this crisis.
"A consensus has emerged that at least part of the reason for oil’s plunge stems from unprecedented financial-market strains that forced speculative investors to dump assets and raise cash. Speculators include funds, banks and other financial institutions trading to gain from price movements, rather than hedge against them for commercial reasons…
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