Federal Reserve Economic Data

What does it mean for a currency to be “strong”? The US dollar is considered stronger than another currency if one or both statements below are true:

1. The prices of goods and services are cheaper in dollars than in that other currency.
2. It costs more than one unit of that other currency to purchase one US dollar.

Analysts and politicians have described some current policies of the federal government as an attempt to weaken the US dollar because they consider it to be too strong for a healthy economy.

To see whether the US dollar has been weakened, we plot its exchange rate with the euro, Japanese yen, and Swiss franc. If the US dollar has indeed grown weaker since January 2025, we’d expect a decrease in the cost of a US dollar in these three relatively stable currencies.

Our first FRED graph, above, does show a downward trend in 2025, suggesting a weakening of the dollar against these currencies. The yen and franc are widely considered “safe haven” currencies. Does the US dollar also exhibit this behavior against the currencies of emerging economies?

Our second FRED graph, below, plots the dollar’s exchange rates with the currencies of the founding members of BRICS: Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. These exchange rate trends vary: Since January 2025, the dollar has depreciated more significantly against the Russian ruble than against any other currency in either graph. But the dollar has been stable in relation to the Indian rupee and Chinese yuan.

Finally, for a balanced view of the dollar’s value, we plot the nominal broad US dollar index. This index is a weighted average of the US dollar’s foreign exchange value against major US trading partners, including the euro area, all founding BRICS members except South Africa, and other major US trading partners such as Canada and Mexico. Since January 20, 2025, we see a clear depreciation in the US dollar across this  basket of foreign currencies.

The takeaway: Recent exchange rates with stable currencies (e.g., the euro, yen, and Swiss franc) suggest a general weakening in the US dollar, which is consistent with the current federal administration’s stated preferences. But this depreciation is not uniform across all nations.

How these graphs were created: First graph: Search FRED for and select “Currency Conversions: US Dollar Exchange Rate: Average of Daily Rates: National Currency: USD for Euro Area (19 Countries).” From the “Edit Graph” panel, under “Edit Lines” tab, select Line 1 and change the units from euros to “Index” and enter the date 2025-01-01 to equal 100 in your custom index. Use the “Add Line” tab to search for, select, and adjust the same series for Switzerland and Japan. To create the vertical line in January 2025, use “Add Line”/”Create Line”/“Create user-defined line”: Set the start and end dates to 2025-01-01 and set the start and end values to 80 and 105, respectively. Use the “Format” tab to customize line colors. Second graph: Repeat the same steps for Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. Third graph: Graph “Nominal Broad U.S. Dollar Index.” From the “Edit Graph” panel, under “Edit Lines,” change the units to “Index (Scales value to 100 for chosen date)” and choose 2025-01-20. To create the vertical line, set the start and end dates to 2025-01-20 and set the start and end values to 90 and 102.

Suggested by Paulina Restrepo-Echavarría and Mickenzie Bass.

The FRED Blog has celebrated each time we’ve published 100 posts. The commentary on these milestones is sometimes only tenuously related to the number of the post, especially after we surpassed 1000. Today’s post is number 1111, which evokes thoughts of numerologists and data-conscious folk who need to point out when their clock shows 11:11. Today is also just a few days shy of November 11, Veterans Day this year. And, for some, corduroy appreciation day.

So, we went fishing into FRED and came up with a couple of graphs for 1111. The one above shows that the share of GDP in GDP is consistently 1, period after period. Just to be thorough, the graph shows the data with both an annual and a quarterly frequency. We’ll keep this graph in mind for post number 11,111. Note that these series come from the GDP release, Section 1 (Domestic Product and Income), Table 1.1.10.

Our second graph comes from FRED’s collection of recession indicators: This series has a value of 1 for every month when the US was deemed to be in recession and 0 otherwise. Such series are called indicator series or sometimes dummy series. The OECD also used to present such recession indicators for its member countries until 2022. More can be found on this page.

You can cast your own thematic net into the great pond of FRED and see what you come up with.

How these graphs were created: For the first graph, search FRED for and select GDP share of GDP’s quarterly series. It may be easier to use the series ID: A191RE1Q156NBEA. Click on “Edit Graph,” open the “Add Line” tab, and search for GDP share of GDP annual series: ID A191RE1A156NBEA. For the second graph, search FRED for “NBER recession” and click one of the options.

Suggested by Christian Zimmermann.

The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) sets or manages several interest rates related to monetary policy. The FRED Blog has discussed this before. Today we tap into some recently added FRED data to describe how the Federal Reserve System keeps the effective federal funds rate (the FOMC’s preferred monetary policy instrument) between its upper and lower target range limits.

The FRED graph above shows two different categories of rates.

• An interest rate set by financial markets
  • Solid red line: The effective federal funds rate, which is set by financial institutions who charge one another for overnight loans in what is known as the federal funds market.
• Interest rates set by the FOMC
  • Dotted orange lines: The targeted upper and lower limits of rates for trading in the federal funds market, described above.
  • Dashed dark blue line: The Discount Window primary credit rate, which is the overnight rate charged to financial institutions that borrow from Federal Reserve Banks.
  • Dashed light blue line: The Standing Repo Facility minimum bid rate, which is the minimum bid rate accepted by the New York Fed for propositions in Standing Repo (repurchase agreement) Facility operations. Repo transactions add short-term liquidity to financial markets.
  • Dashed purple line: The reverse repo (repurchase agreement) award rate, which is the minimum bid rate accepted by the New York Fed for propositions in reverse repo operations. Reverse repo transactions withdraw liquidity from financial markets.

In short, Federal Reserve Banks (which manage the discount window in their own Districts) and the New York Fed (which manages daily repo and reverse repo transactions) generally maintain the effective federal funds rate within the target range set by the FOMC.

The New York Fed’s website has more detail about daily financial markets and monetary policy implementation.

Notes: Don’t worry if you can’t separate some of the lines in the graph: Both the Discount window’s primary credit rate (in dark blue) and the Standing Repo Facility minimum bid rate (in light blue) are closely linked to the top of the target range (in orange). Similarly, the reverse repo award rate (in purple) is closely linked to the bottom of the target range (in orange). These relationships are a matter of choice, not rule.

How this graph was created: Search FRED for and select “Federal Funds Target Range – Upper Limit.” Click on the “Edit Graph” button and select the “Add Line” tab to search for “Discount Window Primary Credit Rate.” Don’t forget to click on “Add data series.” Repeat the last two steps to search for and add the other four series: “Standing Repo Facility Minimum Bid Rate”, “Federal Funds Effective Rate”, “Overnight Reverse Repurchase Agreements Award Rate”, and “Federal Funds Target Range – Lower Limit.”

Suggested by Diego Mendez-Carbajo.