President Barack Obama's choice for leader of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission has vowed to crack down on the kind of speculation that many blamed for last year's sky-high oil prices and volatile swings across energy markets.

Gary Gensler, a former US Treasury official and partner at Goldman Sachs, has also pledged to help bring transparency to the hitherto unregulated market for credit default swaps, which many claim exacerbated the financial crisis.