The FOMC is the US Federal Reserve committee that sets interest rates. Here's why its eight meetings a year move the dollar and every pair it touches.

What is the FOMC?

The FOMC is the Federal Open Market Committee — the arm of the US Federal Reserve that sets American interest rates. Eight times a year it meets, decides where to put the federal funds rate, and publishes what it thinks comes next. Because the dollar sits on one side of most currency pairs, those decisions carry into the whole FX market. No scheduled event moves more pairs at once.

Who they are

The FOMC has twelve voting members: the seven Federal Reserve governors, the president of the New York Fed, and four of the remaining eleven regional Fed presidents on a rotating basis. They meet eight times a year, roughly every six weeks. Each meeting produces three things markets care about:

The rate decision — where the federal funds rate is set.
The statement — the wording that explains the decision.
The projections and press conference — where the chair takes questions and the "dot plot" shows where members expect rates to go.

How it moves FX

A currency's appeal is tied to the return on holding it, and the federal funds rate is that return for the dollar. When the FOMC raises rates, or signals it will, dollar assets pay more and the dollar tends to strengthen. When it cuts, or hints at cutting, the dollar usually softens. The market rarely waits for the decision itself — by the time the meeting arrives, an expected move is often already priced. What moves price is the surprise: a change nobody expected, or a shift in tone about future meetings.

The decision is only half the event. The statement wording and the chair's tone in the press conference often move price more than the rate number, because they reset expectations for the meetings still to come.

An example

Say the market is fully expecting the Fed to hold rates steady, and it does — but the chair warns that inflation is proving sticky and further rises are on the table. That is a hawkish surprise with no rate change at all. EUR/USD might fall 80 pips in the hour as traders reprice. A trader long one standard lot — around £8 a pip — watches roughly £640 disappear, not because rates moved, but because the outlook did.

Why it matters

The FOMC is scheduled to the minute, which is both a warning and a trap.

Known date — you can plan around it or step aside.
High volatility — spreads widen and price can gap through a stop.
Two-stage — the decision lands, then the press conference half an hour later can reverse the first move entirely.

For an automated system this is dangerous ground. An EA that does not read the calendar will trade straight into the announcement, taking the slippage and the whipsaw that follow. Plenty of blown accounts trace back to one Fed meeting the strategy never saw coming.

The Karnek note

Karnek reads your live terminal and does nothing else — it will not trade an FOMC meeting for you, hedge one out, or flatten a position before the print. What it shows is how your accounts behaved through the event afterwards: the trades your EAs opened, the slippage they took, the drawdown that followed. Karnek can never place or close a trade on the account.

See it in Karnek: monitor your accounts live with Karnek.