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Modernizing the Regulatory and Supervisory Landscape
AI In a speech at the Community Banking Research Conference, the Fed's Vice Chair for Supervision reviews progress since 2024 on supporting community banks, including refocused supervision, an 8 percent community bank leverage ratio, and the end of the Novel Activities Supervision Program. He identifies remaining work on merger competitive analysis, de novo bank formation and call report streamlining, and says the Board proposed Regulation O revisions in July and will consider indexed updates to fixed-dollar asset thresholds, with updates every five years, later this year.
The Data Version of Godzilla versus Kong: FRED Takes on AI
AI In this 1 October 2026 speech, a Federal Reserve Board official traces FRED's history from a 1961 mailed data digest to 850,000+ series and 18 million unique users in 2025, and announces that users seeking certain Federal Reserve Board data will soon be routed to FRED. He says AI both widens data use and brings risks such as hallucination and misattribution, notes FRED traffic is growing 150 percent a year with about half of visits now from AI agents, and describes the new FRED MCP Connector for linking FRED data to AI agents.
The U.S. Economy and Monetary Policy
AI In this speech, a Federal Reserve official says the U.S. economy is resilient, with GDP growing 2.4 percent in the first half of 2026, unemployment at 4.1 percent in August and risks to activity and employment roughly balanced. Inflation is too high, with the 12-month PCE price index at 3.4 percent in August and above the 2 percent target for more than five years, and the speaker sees upside risks to inflation, driven largely by energy prices. The speaker also plans to discuss last month's FOMC decision and how the future path of policy will be assessed.
Modernizing Financial Regulation: Initial Observations from eSLR
AI In this speech, the Fed's Vice Chair for Supervision argues that the enhanced supplementary leverage ratio (eSLR) had become a binding constraint on large bank dealers' Treasury market intermediation. He describes the recalibration finalized in November 2025, which sets the GSIB eSLR buffer at 50 percent of the method-1 surcharge (capped at one percent for depository subsidiaries), effective April 1, 2026, and reports early evidence that dealers gained nearly $5 trillion of eSLR headroom in Q1 2026 and increased Treasury positions.
The Dual Mandate in Rural America
AI In this 30 September 2026 speech, a Federal Reserve Governor reviews rural America's economy in terms of the Fed's dual mandate. She reports that rural unemployment has generally tracked the national rate, while labor force participation and job creation are lower than in urban areas, and that rural inflation rose faster than urban inflation in the early pandemic recovery, driven by energy and housing costs. She also notes that this is the first national Investing in Rural America conference organized by all 12 Reserve Banks and the Board, and says she will address small businesses and System research and outreach on rural economies.
Opening Remarks
AI In opening remarks to the 2026 Community Bank Cyber Workshop, hosted by five Federal Reserve Banks, the speaker says AI adds complexity to the cyber threat landscape for banks, and that defense should rest on strong cyber hygiene, employee training, incident response testing and board and management oversight. The speaker cites the Financial Stability Board's June 10, 2026 report on Sound Practices for Responsible Adoption of AI, invites community bank feedback on supervisory expectations, and notes that IT examinations are tailored to each bank's risk profile.
Economic Conditions and Monetary Policy
AI In this speech in Detroit, the speaker describes the city's economy and reports that U.S. GDP grew at roughly a 2 percent rate in the first half of 2026. Inflation has been above the FOMC's 2 percent target for five and a half years, with only two months in the past 20 consistent with 2 percent core PCE inflation, while the labor market is in rough balance and the speaker plans to discuss AI and the role of monetary policy.
Payments in the Age of AI Agents
An Update on AI and the Economy
AI In this 28 September 2026 speech at Oakland Tech Week, a Federal Reserve Board governor describes AI as a general-purpose technology on par with the steam engine, electricity and the internet, and sets out a framework for its implications for the Fed's dual mandate. On inflation, the speaker says AI-related goods prices have surged, much of it from sector-specific demand that monetary policy should not target, but sees some broadening pressure: electricity and water costs are each up around 5 percent over the past year, core goods prices are running above a 3 percent annual pace, and only a small fraction of the $2 trillion in announced AI investment has been spent.