Federal Reserve Releases September 2026 FOMC Economic Projections Following September 15-16 Meeting

Key Takeaways

• The Federal Reserve Board and FOMC released participants' economic projections tables and charts on September 16, 2026, following the September 15-16 meeting.
• The release is informational and imposes no direct compliance obligations.
• It matters to compliance and risk teams because the projections inform interest rate, liquidity, and macroeconomic assumptions used in stress testing, capital planning, and risk governance.

Deep Dive

The Federal Reserve Board and FOMC released participants' economic projections tables and charts on September 16, 2026, following the September 15-16 meeting. The release is informational and imposes no direct compliance obligations. It matters to compliance and risk teams because the projections inform interest rate, liquidity, and macroeconomic assumptions used in stress testing, capital planning, and risk governance.

For compliance teams, there are no new requirements, reporting obligations, or deadlines. The relevance is indirect. Projections of the policy rate path and macroeconomic conditions feed assumptions in interest rate risk in the banking book (IRRBB), liquidity risk management, allowance for credit losses (CECL) forecasting, and internal stress testing and capital planning. Model risk and validation functions may also need to confirm that forward-looking scenario assumptions remain reasonable and documented. Consumer-facing teams may see downstream effects on variable-rate product disclosures, pricing, and fair lending or UDAAP considerations if rates change.

Recommended actions: (1) obtain and review the full projections PDF and compare it against current internal baseline and adverse scenarios; (2) alert Treasury, Finance, Credit Risk, and ALM stakeholders to determine whether assumption updates are warranted; (3) document any scenario or model assumption changes in line with model risk management expectations (e.g., SR 11-7); (4) confirm that the next ALCO and risk committee materials reflect the updated outlook; and (5) monitor for the FOMC policy statement and meeting minutes, which will provide additional context.

Risk impact is low from a direct compliance standpoint but potentially meaningful for financial and market risk if projections diverge from internal assumptions. Projections are not commitments and may change with incoming data, so institutions should avoid treating them as certainties and should maintain governance over how external forecasts are used in decision-making.

Source: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System