On FOMC days NQ trades in a narrower range than usual until the 2:00 PM statement (about 0.7 times a normal day). Then the first hour after the statement is about 3 times wider than the same hour on an ordinary day (232 points vs 70 lately), and price typically swings both ways more than 3 times as far as usual before picking a direction. The first move's direction told us nothing about the close.
What we measured
We took the 99 scheduled FOMC statement days since 2014 that have one-minute NQ data (emergency meetings, like March 2020, are left out) and compared the session around the 2:00 PM Eastern statement with the same times on ordinary days. Since 2019 every meeting has a press conference at 2:30 PM, so the first hour covers the statement and most of the press conference.
| Since Oct 2024 (15 FOMC days) | FOMC day | Ordinary day | Since 2014 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Opening range, 9:30–9:45 | 89 pts | 106 pts | 0.9× |
| Net move 15 minutes after 2:00 | 58 pts | 14 pts | 3.7× |
| Range of the first hour after 2:00 | 232 pts | 70 pts | 2.9× |
| Whipsaw: smaller of the up and down swings, first 15 min | 20 pts | 8 pts | 3.4× |
| Regular session, 9:30–16:00 | 342 pts | 279 pts | 1.2× |
The morning is quieter than normal
Traders wait for the Fed. On FOMC days the 9:30–9:45 opening range was 10–20% smaller than normal, and the whole session up to 2:00 PM 20–30% narrower, in both the older and the newer data. NQ also rose from 9:30 to 2:00 on only 40% of FOMC days, against 53% of ordinary days. The well-known pre-FOMC rally in academic studies is measured over the 24 hours before the announcement; inside the regular session we didn't see it.
Then it whipsaws
After 2:00 PM, the first hour's range was almost three times normal, and the whipsaw (the smaller of the up and down swings in the first 15 minutes) was 3.4 times normal: the largest of any release we tested. The biggest 15-minute reactions were December 19, 2018 and September 21, 2022, both about 2%.
Is the first move the wrong move?
A common saying is that the first reaction to the Fed is the wrong one. In our data it's closer to a coin flip: the rest of the session continued the first 15 minutes' direction 45% of the time (50% on ordinary days), and continued the first 30 minutes' direction, which takes it into the press conference, 51% of the time (52% on ordinary days). Neither is a reliable signal.
What this means in practice
- Morning breakout strategies see smaller ranges than usual on FOMC days; fewer clean moves before 2:00 PM is normal.
- At 2:00, expect both sides to get hit. A stop that's fine on an ordinary afternoon is often inside the first 15-minute whipsaw.
- The press conference at 2:30 can reverse the statement move, but in our data it wasn't predictably either way.
- Four meetings a year (March, June, September, December) include economic projections, the "dot plot"; the economic calendar marks them.
Historical statistics, not a trading signal. Past market behavior doesn't guarantee future behavior. Meeting dates from the Federal Reserve's FOMC calendars.