Georgetown Law

Professor Buffa currently serves as the Assistant Chief of the Office of Cooperative Enforcement (“OCE”) at the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (“CFTC”). He runs OCE and is the primary liaison to the CFTC’s civil and criminal partners at the federal and state levels. He advises and assists criminal and civil authorities in investigating and prosecuting commodities law violators. His expertise also includes federal regulation of derivative transactions, addressing complex regulatory and policy issues, and litigating civil enforcement actions in Federal Courts throughout the country.

Recently, Professor Buffa served as Senior Counsel to CFTC Commissioner Summer K. Mersinger, providing her legal counsel and advice on various regulatory, enforcement, and policy matters. He previously served as Special Counsel and Policy Advisor to former CFTC Commissioner Scott D. O’Malia, where he advised the Commissioner on the implementation and promulgation of regulations pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (“Dodd-Frank”).

Professor Buffa is a seasoned litigator who engages in federal court civil prosecution of violators of federal commodities and derivatives laws. As the front-line litigator, he is responsible for all aspects of enforcement investigations and litigations from inception to conclusion. He has been the CFTC lead counsel on numerous civil enforcement matters, including the $7 billion fraud case CFTC v. Walsh (W.G. Trading) et al. and the $150 million precious metals fraud case brought by the CFTC and 30 State Securities Regulators, CFTC et al. v. TMTE (Metals.com) et al. In the Metals.com case, the CFTC and 30 state regulators stopped a massive fraudulent scheme targeting elderly persons nationwide. The Metals.com civil enforcement action is the largest joint filing between CFTC and state regulators in history.

Professor Buffa is an Alternate Secretary on the CFTC’s Energy and Environmental Markets Advisory Committee (“EEMAC”). EEMAC provides advice and recommendations to the CFTC on various regulatory and market issues that affect the integrity and competitiveness of U.S. markets and facilitates communication between the CFTC and market participants, other regulators, and academics. EEMAC will discuss the broader move to electrification and other solutions to advance sustainability and America’s transition to renewable and cleaner energy. Specifically, Professor Buffa leads the Metals Subcommittee, which focuses on the role of the metals market as components in transitional energy sources and the potential impact on financial markets regulated by the CFTC.

Professor Buffa also co-authored the CFTC-SEC Joint Study on Algorithmic Descriptions for Complex and Standardized Financial Derivatives and served on the CFTC’s Technology Advisory Committee. He is a regular speaker, panelist, and roundtable participant at conferences sponsored by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Justice, Department of Treasury, Securities and Exchange Commission, North American Securities Administrators Association, and numerous industry forums.

Prior to joining the CFTC, Mr. Buffa was an attorney at three major national and international law firms. He also worked in the counsel’s office of Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign and was a whip to the Republican National Committee’s Rules Committee and the New Jersey delegation at the Republican National Convention.

Professor Buffa is active in the local community. He is the President of the Eudora Civic Association. He was the longtime President of the Beekman Place Condominium Association and was formerly a member of the Parish Pastoral Council (Board of Directors) of the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in D.C. He was an elected Commissioner on the District of Columbia’s Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC 1C-08) for the Adams Morgan neighborhood. Professor Buffa serves on the Board of Directors of the Optimist Club of Greater Vienna (Virginia) and sits on the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society’s Financial Services and Electronic Commerce Practice Group.

Professor Buffa is a graduate of Notre Dame Law School and Boston College’s Carroll School of Management, cum laude, with a double major in Finance and Marketing.