FOMC meetings: schedule, statement, minutes and how to read them

The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) is the part of the Federal Reserve that sets US interest-rate policy, and its meetings are the most closely watched scheduled events in financial markets. Eight times a year the committee meets for two days in Washington, and at 2:00 p.m. Eastern time on the second day it publishes a short statement saying what it decided. Treasury yields, the dollar, stock-index futures and gold can all move within seconds.

This guide explains the meeting cycle from start to finish: the published calendar, what is released and when, how to read a statement for what changed, and what the minutes add three weeks later. It then uses the history of the target range from December 2008 to October 2026, every step of it, to show how often the committee actually moves and how big the moves are.

The calendar

The committee publishes its meeting dates a year or more ahead. The 2026 schedule:

The committee can also act between meetings. It did so twice in March 2020: a cut that took effect on March 4, and a cut to 0% to 0.25% announced on Sunday, March 15. It can also vote by notation without meeting in person; the calendar lists one such notation vote, on August 22, 2025, the same day the committee released its revised longer-run strategy statement.

What happens at a meeting

The schedule is the same every time.

Before the meeting. Staff prepare forecasts and briefing material on the economy, financial markets and policy options. Markets, meanwhile, go into decision day on the last guidance they heard: the previous statement, minutes and projections.

Day one and the morning of day two. All participants, the seven governors and the 12 Reserve Bank presidents, discuss the economy and financial conditions. Each gives a view on policy. Only the 12 voting members (the governors, the New York Fed president and four rotating presidents) vote at the end. The Federal Reserve: structure, mandate and policy tools explains the rotation.

2:00 p.m. Eastern, day two. Two documents appear at once:

• The statement. Usually a few hundred words: the committee's read on activity, jobs and inflation; its decision on the target range; a sentence of guidance; and the roll call, with any dissents and what each dissenter preferred.
• The implementation note. The technical settings that make the decision work: interest on reserve balances (IORB), the overnight reverse repo and standing repo rates, the discount rate and instructions for the balance sheet. Federal funds rate: target range, IORB and the effective rate explains each.

At projection meetings the Summary of Economic Projections comes out at the same time, with each participant's forecasts for growth, unemployment, inflation and the appropriate policy rate. The The Fed dot plot: how to read the FOMC’s rate projections page reads one in detail.

The press conference. The Chair then reads a short opening statement and takes questions. Every regularly scheduled meeting on the 2026 calendar has a press conference listed alongside its statement.

Three weeks later: the minutes. The minutes summarize the discussion without naming who said what, and they often reveal how divided the committee was, which risks worried it and how it is thinking about the balance sheet. The minutes of the September 15–16, 2026 meeting were released on October 7, 2026.

Reading a statement: an example

The September 16, 2026 statement announced a 25 basis point increase in the target range to 3-3/4% to 4%. The vote was 12 to 0. The implementation note, effective September 17, moved every administered rate by the same 25 bp:

Six weeks later, on October 28, 2026, the committee held the range at 3.75% to 4.00%, but the vote was 10 to 2, and both dissenters preferred another 25 bp increase. A hold with two hawkish dissents tells a different story from a unanimous hold: some voters wanted more. That is the kind of detail a reader learns to look for.

Every step since 2008

The chart turns 18 years of meetings into a staircase. Counting the changes in the top of the range:

That is 32 changes in about 140 scheduled meetings. Three patterns stand out:

• Long pauses are normal. The range sat at 5.25% to 5.50% from July 2023 to September 2024, and at 4.25% to 4.50% from December 2024 to September 2025.
• Moves come in runs. The committee rarely moves once. Hikes and cuts cluster into cycles, which is why markets care so much about the first move of a cycle.
• Step size signals urgency. For most of the period 25 bp was the default. The four 75 bp hikes of June, July, September and November 2022, and the 100 bp cut of March 2020, were exceptions, made when the committee wanted to move fast.

Why meetings move markets

Most of a decision is usually priced in before 2:00 p.m.: traders in fed funds futures and short-dated Treasuries have spent weeks estimating what the committee will do. Prices move on the surprise: a different decision, an unexpected dissent, a change of wording, or a shift in the median dot. The same rate decision can send yields up or down depending on what was expected. How Fed decisions move markets: expectations, surprises and yields covers this in detail, and How interest rates affect stocks: discount rates and equity duration explains why stocks care.

Pitfalls

• Treating the decision as the news. A widely expected 25 bp move is old news by 2:00 p.m. The vote, the wording and the projections usually carry the surprise.
• Reading the first minute of trading. Prices often swing one way on the statement and reverse during the press conference.
• Ignoring the implementation note. Technical changes to IORB or the balance sheet can matter for money markets even when the range does not move.
• Over-reading the minutes. They are a summary written after the fact; they describe the range of views, not a vote count on future moves.
• Confusing effective dates. FRED and many datasets record a change on the day it took effect, which is the day after the announcement.

FOMC releases compared

How Finabase does it

Finabase does not have an economic calendar, FOMC dates or a Fed decision feed, and it does not show fed funds futures. The staircase chart above is ours, built by Finabase Research from Federal Reserve data on FRED. To watch how markets react on a meeting day, use the live prices the app does carry:

• The 2-year Treasury yield and the rest of the Treasury yields table, which move first on a surprise.
• The futures list, with stock-index futures and Treasury futures side by side.
• Fed news on Discover for coverage of the statement and press conference.

Frequently asked questions

How many times a year does the FOMC meet?

Eight times on a published schedule, usually over two days. It can also hold unscheduled meetings or vote by notation, as it did twice in March 2020 to cut rates between scheduled meetings.

What time is the Fed announcement?

The statement and implementation note are released at 2:00 p.m. Eastern time on the last day of the meeting. The Chair's press conference follows later that afternoon.

When are the FOMC minutes released?

Three weeks after the policy decision. For the September 15–16, 2026 meeting, the minutes came out on October 7, 2026.

Which FOMC meetings have the dot plot?

The March, June, September and December meetings, which publish the Summary of Economic Projections. In 2026 those were March 17–18, June 16–17, September 15–16 and December 8–9.

Does the Fed change rates at every meeting?

No. In 2026 through October it changed the target range once in seven meetings. Since December 2008 the top of the range has changed 32 times.

Summary

The FOMC meets eight times a year on a calendar published in advance. At 2:00 p.m. Eastern on the final day it releases a statement with its decision and vote and an implementation note with the technical rate settings; the Chair holds a press conference; four meetings a year add the Summary of Economic Projections; and minutes follow three weeks later. Since December 2008 the target range has moved 32 times, mostly in 25 bp steps that cluster into cycles separated by long pauses. In September 2026 the committee raised the range to 3.75% to 4.00% unanimously and held it there in October with two dissents favoring more. Because markets price expected decisions in advance, the useful skill is reading what was new: the vote, the wording and the projections.