Macro Data Explained

FOMC Federal Funds Rate Decision

The anchor of global asset pricing: every Fed decision redefines the risk-free rate — and stocks, the dollar, gold and crypto all dance to it.

📅8 FOMC meetings a year (every 6–7 weeks)

Nonfarm Payrolls (Employment Situation Report)

The monthly storm of the first Friday: payrolls, unemployment and wage growth — the highest-weight input into the Fed's policy path.

📅Monthly (first Friday, 8:30 AM ET)

Consumer Price Index (CPI)

The official thermometer of inflation: every CPI surprise rewrites the Fed's hike/cut path — the biggest recurring mover among data events.

📅Monthly (mid-month, 8:30 AM ET)

US Unemployment Rate (U-3)

The labor market's thermometer and the recession "red alert": a sustained rise in unemployment is one of America's most reliable recession signals.

📅Monthly (first Friday, with NFP)

EIA Weekly Petroleum Status Report

The weekly physical of the oil market: commercial crude stock changes are the most direct read of supply-demand reality — and the Wednesday-night volatility timer.

📅Weekly (Wed 10:30 AM ET, holidays shift)

Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index (PCE)

The Fed's official inflation yardstick: the market argues over CPI, the FOMC reads PCE — the 2% target is anchored here.

📅Monthly (month-end, 8:30 AM ET)

ISM Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index

The first-workday physical of the economy: above or below the 50 line, it is the monthly lead on GDP and the earliest inflection detector.

📅Monthly (start of month, mfg + services)

Advance Monthly Retail Trade Report

The monthly pulse of consumption: with consumer spending at 68% of GDP, its nominal print must shed inflation to reveal real demand.

📅Monthly (mid-month, 8:30 AM ET)

Weekly Initial Jobless Claims

The labor market's high-frequency ECG: updated every Thursday, four times faster than NFP — the first alarm of a layoff wave sounds here.

📅Weekly (Thu 8:30 AM ET)

ADP National Employment Report

The "mini NFP": a private-sector employment preview that lands two days before the official print — often wrong, never ignorable.

📅Monthly (8:15 AM ET, NFP week)

University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index

A thermometer for the consumer and an anchor-meter for inflation expectations: the final print's 4-star billing is half sentiment, half that expectations line.

📅Twice monthly (prelim mid-month, final month-end, 10 AM ET)

Gross Domestic Product (BEA Quarterly Report)

The official scoreboard of total output: GDP's structure sets the market's tone more than its headline — the final arbiter of recession versus soft landing.

📅Quarterly, three estimates (advance → second → final)

Average Hourly Earnings (jobs-report component)

The most "inflationary" line of the jobs report: wages are the biggest cost of core services inflation — when pay runs hot, the Fed leans in.

📅Monthly (8:30 AM ET, with NFP)

Producer Price Index

CPI's upstream: factory-gate prices move first and retail prices follow — PPI is the forward sentry of the inflation chain.

📅Monthly (8:30 AM ET, mid-month)

ISM Services PMI (Non-Manufacturing Index)

The "other half" that is 70% of the US economy: the factory line gets the headlines, services IS the economy — and both sides of 50 tell a story.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, 3rd business day)

S&P Global US PMI (formerly IHS Markit)

The earliest pulse in global macro: the flash print beats everyone — but the frame differs from ISM, and divergence is not error.

📅Twice monthly (flash late month, final early month)

New York Fed Survey of Consumer Expectations (SCE)

The household anchor-meter: the Fed's real fear is not CPI but what people "believe" inflation will be — this survey measures exactly that.

📅Monthly (around mid-month)

U.S. Import and Export Price Indexes

The transmission sheet for FX and commodities: the dollar's swing and oil's moves become business costs here first — then climb into CPI.

📅Monthly (8:30 AM ET, mid-month)

Existing-Home Sales (NAR)

The flow gauge of US housing: closing-based and mortgage-rate sensitive — every rate move hits existing sales first.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, ~20th)

Housing Starts and Building Permits (Census/HUD)

The supply-side thermometer of housing: starts are today's action, permits tomorrow's vote — and single-family versus multifamily must be read apart.

📅Monthly (8:30 AM ET, mid-month)

New Single-Family Home Sales (Census)

The builder's cash register: contract-basis and heavily revised — but with no lock-in effect, one of the most honest housing reads of a high-rate era.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, ~23rd–25th)

Pending Home Sales Index (NAR)

The trailer before the movie: signings lead closings by 1–2 months — for housing direction, read the contract ledger first.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, last week)

S&P/Case-Shiller and FHFA Home Price Indexes (same-day releases)

Housing's stock pricing: two frames released the same day, two months lagged — home-price stickiness is the long lever of core inflation.

📅Monthly (~last Tuesday, 9–10 AM ET)

NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI)

The builder's felt temperature: one survey around the 50 line, sensing the chill of rates one step before the hard data do.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, 15th–18th)

Construction Spending Report (Census)

The dollar-total view of construction: residential, nonresidential and public in one report — the direct raw material of GDP's building components.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, 1st business day)

Advance Report on Durable Goods (Census)

The heartbeat of business capex — and the birthplace of the classic "one Boeing order wrecks the month" moment.

📅Monthly (8:30 AM ET, ~25th)

Manufacturers' Shipments, Inventories and Orders (M3, Census)

Durable goods' revised-and-completed edition: low market attention is real — but the inventory-to-shipments ratio is its signature component.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, 1st–2nd business day)

Business Inventories and Sales Report (Census)

The inventory-cycle thermometer: changes in inventories are the hidden protagonist of GDP volatility — restocking versus destocking is judged here.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, mid-month)

Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization (G.17, Federal Reserve)

The physical read of hard output: surveys capture sentiment, this counts tons and machine-hours — with 80% capacity utilization as the classic inflation line.

📅Monthly (9:15 AM ET, 15th–17th)

Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index (CCI)

The other consumer thermometer beside Michigan: labor-market heavy with a bigger sample — a collapsing expectations component is the classic recession-narrative fuse.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, last Tuesday)

Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS, BLS)

Powell's named yardstick of rebalancing: job openings versus unemployed workers — the depth of labor demand lives in this report.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, early month)

Challenger, Gray & Christmas Job Cut Report

An announcement-based layoff radar: earlier and more emotional than claims — the thermometer of AI-restructuring and cost-cut narratives.

📅Monthly (7:30 AM ET, 1st business day)

Regional Fed Manufacturing Surveys (Empire State / Philly Fed / Richmond / Dallas)

The month's earliest manufacturing pulses: New York leads off, Philadelphia relays — both sides of zero are a directional vote.

📅Monthly per district (Empire ~15th 8:30 AM, Philly 3rd Thu 10 AM ET)

Chicago Purchasing Managers' Index (ISM-Chicago)

The month's last PMI: historically tightly linked to next month's ISM — the weathervane for the coming month's manufacturing narrative.

📅Monthly (9:45 AM ET, last business day)

EIA Weekly Natural Gas Storage Report

The weekly heartbeat of natural gas: the gap versus the 5-year average is the only protagonist — heating and injection seasons run two entirely different scripts.

📅Weekly (Thu 10:30 AM ET)

Baker Hughes Rig Count

The forward bell of shale supply: rigs to completions to output lags 6–12 months — but the shale efficiency revolution broke "rigs equal production".

📅Weekly (Fri 1:00 PM ET)

U.S. Trade in Goods and Services (Census/BEA)

The monthly raw material of net exports in GDP: deficits are the structural norm — the monthly story is oil and tariffs, the trend story is the dollar and policy.

📅Monthly (8:30 AM ET, early month)

U.S. Current Account Balance (BEA)

America's ledger with the world: low-frequency but structural — the deficit's sustainability rests on the dollar's reserve-currency status.

📅Quarterly (mid-to-late in the quarter)

U.S. Treasury Auctions (with the Quarterly Refunding calendar)

The demand check-up for the long end: award rates, bid-to-cover, tails — the arena where supply shocks wrestle the term premium.

📅Per Treasury auction calendar (~monthly for the 10-year)

Conference Board Leading Economic Index (LEI)

The synthetic dashboard of recession warning: ten components rolled into one direction — "six consecutive monthly declines plus a negative y/y" is the classic rule.

📅Monthly (10 AM ET, ~20th)

NFIB Small Business Optimism Index

The check-up for the economy's biggest employer: small business — whose "plans to raise prices" component is a micro lead on inflation.

📅Monthly (6:00 AM ET, 2nd Tuesday)

New York Fed Global Supply Chain Pressure Index (GSCPI)

The synthetic gauge of supply-driven inflation: freight rates plus survey deliveries in standard-deviation units — above zero is pressure, below is slack.

📅Monthly (around the first week)

US Dollar Index (DXY)

The dollar against a basket of majors — the master valve of global liquidity: a strong DXY pressures risk assets broadly; a weak one lifts almost everything.

📅Real-time quote (ICE)

OPEC+ Ministerial Meetings (Production Policy)

The supply valve of roughly half the world's crude: every OPEC+ production decision reprices oil — and puts volatility on the energy calendar.

📅Monthly report; OPEC+ meetings as scheduled

US Quarterly Earnings Season

The midterm-exam season for stocks: over roughly six weeks every listed company reports — single-stock fireworks and index direction both get set here.

📅Quarterly seasons (Jan/Apr/Jul/Oct)

Geopolitical Risk Events

The market's unpredictable variable: wars, sanctions, elections and trade conflicts — the opening ceremony for havens (gold/dollar/franc) and the ignition of volatility.

📅Event-driven, no fixed schedule