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Manipulation In The Agricultural Commodities Futures Market: Application Of Benford's Law, Frank Tenkorang, Greg Nies

Mountain Plains Journal of Business and Technology

This paper proposes that Benford’s Law is an effective tool for determining futures market irregularities and therefore should be adopted and used in efforts to detect and prevent manipulation in the agriculture commodities futures market. Market manipulation, while hard to define and even harder to detect and prevent, has long been a concern for traders and regulators alike. Market power manipulation – the intentional use of monopolistic power to cause market prices to diverge from their competitive level – harms the market by eroding its efficiency and impairing market integrity thereby driving away potential traders and ultimately undermining financial markets, …