Economic Calendar Trading
Plan macro-event risk from live official calendars, time-stamped consensus, release vintages, and observable price triggers. Surprise matters, but revisions, components, positioning, uncertainty, and regime affect the response.
Event Map
| Event family |
Components to record |
Primary source |
| FOMC |
Decision, statement changes, SEP, press conference |
Federal Reserve |
| Employment |
Payrolls, unemployment, participation, wages, revisions |
BLS |
| Inflation |
Headline/core, monthly/annual, category breadth, revisions |
BLS/BEA |
| Growth/activity |
Real/nominal detail, inventories, revisions, survey components |
Source agency |
Standardized Surprise
Standardized surprise = (Actual - consensus) / historical standard deviation of surprises
Use a point-in-time consensus and same-definition historical series. State source, sample, standard deviation, revisions, and transformation. If history is insufficient, report raw surprise and forecast range without a synthetic score.
Workflow
1. Check Calendar
get_economics_calendar(from_date=<start>, to_date=<end>, impact="high")
Refresh before each session and verify date, time, timezone, and revision policy against the official agency calendar; third-party impact labels are screening aids only.
2. Research Consensus
get_financial_news(topic="<event> forecast consensus <month> <year>", max_results=10)
Extract: consensus forecast, range of estimates, leading indicators, and current market positioning.
3. Build Scenario Matrix
Map component combinations, revisions, and price triggers. Include no trade for mixed releases or failed liquidity conditions; do not assign probabilities without a calibrated model.
4. Post-Release Execution Gate
Use a pretested bar-based delay or price-structure trigger. Require verified actuals, acceptable spread/depth, stable timestamps, and a calculable stop; event labels do not determine a universal waiting period.
5. Trade the Reaction
- Continuation candidate: enter only on the specified closed-bar or retest trigger.
- Fade candidate: define overreaction in normalized returns and test separately; VWAP is a benchmark, not a guaranteed destination.
6. FOMC Analysis
Use get_financial_news to analyze FOMC statements and press conferences for hawk/dove tone shifts.
Analyze the decision, statement redlines, projections, and press conference separately. Measure the response in policy-rate futures/yields and the traded asset; do not infer fixed direction or duration from a hawkish/dovish label.
Evidence and Validation
- Treat the setup as a testable hypothesis, not a prediction. Define thresholds, entry, invalidation, and exit before evaluating outcomes.
- Calibrate on the same instrument, venue, session, and timeframe. Use closed candles and a held-out or walk-forward sample; record every variant tried.
- Include spread, fees, slippage, borrow or funding, partial fills, and latency. Reject the setup when net expectancy is not positive or depends on one narrow parameter.
- Return observed inputs, missing data, cost assumptions, entry, invalidation, exit, and a valid, watch, or no-trade status.
- Research basis: Use the official Federal Reserve calendar and BLS release calendar because dates can change; Federal Reserve research shows reaction depends on surprise, disagreement, and regime.
Key Rules
- Verify actuals and revisions from the primary source before interpretation.
- Use the predeclared execution gate; neither immediate trading nor a fixed wait is universally safe.
- Choose order type from the fill-versus-price-risk tradeoff; limits may not fill and markets may slip.
- Aggregate direct, correlated, and factor exposures in the event stress test.
- Treat clustered or conflicting components as lower confidence or
no trade.
- Size from stress loss, not a vendor impact score.
Related Skills
- sentiment-analysis -- Pre-event sentiment gauges positioning
- sector-rotation -- Macro data drives sector rotation shifts
1---2name: economic-calendar-trading3description: Plan scheduled macro-event risk from official calendars and point-in-time expectations. Use for FOMC, employment, inflation, GDP, or other releases requiring standardized surprise, component, revision, scenario, and execution analysis.4license: Apache-2.05---67# Economic Calendar Trading89Plan macro-event risk from live official calendars, time-stamped consensus, release vintages, and observable price triggers. Surprise matters, but revisions, components, positioning, uncertainty, and regime affect the response.1011## Event Map1213| Event family | Components to record | Primary source |14| --- | --- | --- |15| FOMC | Decision, statement changes, SEP, press conference | Federal Reserve |16| Employment | Payrolls, unemployment, participation, wages, revisions | BLS |17| Inflation | Headline/core, monthly/annual, category breadth, revisions | BLS/BEA |18| Growth/activity | Real/nominal detail, inventories, revisions, survey components | Source agency |1920## Standardized Surprise2122```23Standardized surprise = (Actual - consensus) / historical standard deviation of surprises24```2526Use a point-in-time consensus and same-definition historical series. State source, sample, standard deviation, revisions, and transformation. If history is insufficient, report raw surprise and forecast range without a synthetic score.2728## Workflow2930### 1. Check Calendar3132```33get_economics_calendar(from_date=<start>, to_date=<end>, impact="high")34```3536Refresh before each session and verify date, time, timezone, and revision policy against the official agency calendar; third-party impact labels are screening aids only.3738### 2. Research Consensus3940```41get_financial_news(topic="<event> forecast consensus <month> <year>", max_results=10)42```4344Extract: consensus forecast, range of estimates, leading indicators, and current market positioning.4546### 3. Build Scenario Matrix4748Map component combinations, revisions, and price triggers. Include `no trade` for mixed releases or failed liquidity conditions; do not assign probabilities without a calibrated model.4950### 4. Post-Release Execution Gate5152Use a pretested bar-based delay or price-structure trigger. Require verified actuals, acceptable spread/depth, stable timestamps, and a calculable stop; event labels do not determine a universal waiting period.5354### 5. Trade the Reaction5556- **Continuation candidate**: enter only on the specified closed-bar or retest trigger.57- **Fade candidate**: define overreaction in normalized returns and test separately; VWAP is a benchmark, not a guaranteed destination.5859### 6. FOMC Analysis6061Use `get_financial_news` to analyze FOMC statements and press conferences for hawk/dove tone shifts.6263Analyze the decision, statement redlines, projections, and press conference separately. Measure the response in policy-rate futures/yields and the traded asset; do not infer fixed direction or duration from a hawkish/dovish label.6465## Evidence and Validation6667- Treat the setup as a testable hypothesis, not a prediction. Define thresholds, entry, invalidation, and exit before evaluating outcomes.68- Calibrate on the same instrument, venue, session, and timeframe. Use closed candles and a held-out or walk-forward sample; record every variant tried.69- Include spread, fees, slippage, borrow or funding, partial fills, and latency. Reject the setup when net expectancy is not positive or depends on one narrow parameter.70- Return observed inputs, missing data, cost assumptions, entry, invalidation, exit, and a valid, watch, or no-trade status.71- Research basis: Use the official [Federal Reserve calendar](https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/fomccalendars.htm) and [BLS release calendar](https://www.bls.gov/schedule/) because dates can change; Federal Reserve research shows reaction depends on surprise, disagreement, and regime.7273## Key Rules7475- Verify actuals and revisions from the primary source before interpretation.76- Use the predeclared execution gate; neither immediate trading nor a fixed wait is universally safe.77- Choose order type from the fill-versus-price-risk tradeoff; limits may not fill and markets may slip.78- Aggregate direct, correlated, and factor exposures in the event stress test.79- Treat clustered or conflicting components as lower confidence or `no trade`.80- Size from stress loss, not a vendor impact score.8182## Related Skills8384- **sentiment-analysis** -- Pre-event sentiment gauges positioning85- **sector-rotation** -- Macro data drives sector rotation shifts
SKE-Labs