A federal regulator asked a question this week that every builder of AI agents should expect to hear. Who answers when the agent goes wrong?
CFTC Chairman Mike Selig raised it at a Wednesday forum on artificial intelligence. His agency oversees derivatives markets, CoinDesk reported.
The questions were pointed. “Does the developer of that agent become subject to registration? Who’s liable if the agent goes rogue?” he asked.
The Regulator’s Open Questions
Selig sketched an AI agent that finds trading opportunities and executes them for a user. He said regulators do not yet know how to handle it.
He asked a second question about identity. “How can regulators know who the agent or suite of agents is acting on behalf of?”
His proposed answer was a new kind of check. He floated “know-your-agent,” or KYA, as a cousin of know-your-customer rules.
Selig also argued that crypto offers a model. For years, developers faced uncertainty about whether publishing code could trigger financial rules, he said.
He added a vivid picture of the future. A refrigerator, he suggested, could one day buy groceries with money it earns from staking ether.
The forum also heard from industry. Brett Harrison, CEO of the derivatives exchange firm Architect, said more market participants now use black box algorithms.
The chairman described the technology as a lasting shift. “It’s as real as the printing press, the steam engine, and the internet,” he said. His own agency already uses AI to police those markets, he said.
The CFTC plans another roundtable on 24/7 trading on Dec. 15. The SEC held a similar session last month.
Where Miami Builders Sit
The questions land close to home. Miami is building the kind of agents Selig described, in payments rather than derivatives.
MAIN covered Jeeves raising $110 million for stablecoins. The Miami fintech’s AI tools are designed to handle expense categorization, compliance checks and payment routing. MAIN reported they need minimal human oversight.
A payment routed by software raises the same liability question Selig put to traders.
The theme also ran through Sibos, which Miami hosted this fall. MAIN covered Miami hosting Sibos. One session addressed what a bank must verify before letting an AI agent act for a customer.
ThetaRay’s CEO is pitching “Know Your Agent” as a new compliance category alongside KYC. That is the idea Selig floated.
Another Miami company sits on the infrastructure side. Miami’s doxx.net, which raised $38 million, built a private network that people and their agents share.
Knowing who or what is on a network is the first step toward answering who is accountable.
The liability question is not abstract for payments companies. A bad routing decision can move money to the wrong place within seconds.
What Comes Next
Selig did not announce a rule. The forum was a listening session, and the roundtables show the agency is still gathering views.
Regulators appear to want a human or a company accountable for every agent that moves money. Builders can prepare by keeping logs of what each agent did, who authorized it and which limits applied.
The age of agent-driven finance has a missing piece: the paperwork that says whose agent it is.
Sources:
- CoinDesk: CFTC chief poses questions about policing AI but calls it a road to ‘autonomous trading’ (Oct. 28, 2026)
- MAIN: Miami Fintech Jeeves Raises $110M for Stablecoins (Oct. 1, 2026)
- MAIN: Miami Hosts Sibos 2026 for the First Time (Sept. 28, 2026)
- MAIN: Miami’s doxx.net Raises $38M for Agentic Networking (Oct. 2, 2026)