IMF Meeting

The IMF Meeting is the standing twice-yearly gathering of the International Monetary Fund (IMF, a 191-country organization) and the World Bank Group. It is a calendar event, not a data release, with no index value, sample or forecast of its own. It brings together finance ministers, central bankers, executives, academics, civil society and media.

The cycle began in Savannah, Georgia, USA in March 1946, and the first Annual Meetings followed in Washington in 1946. Washington, D.C. hosts the headquarters, all Spring Meetings and most Annual Meetings.

Spring Meetings take place in April in Washington, while Annual Meetings take place in September or October under a 2-plus-1 Washington rotation rule. Both run as multi-day programmes with no fixed release time, follow Eastern Time in Washington, and schedules appear on the meetings site. Each cycle brings flagship reports such as the World Economic Outlook, plus committee communiques (official statements), press briefings and seminars. Communiques are final when issued, forecasts are revised across editions, and observers watch policy language and forecast revisions without any trading rule.

The meeting itself has no market-moving number, so attention falls on its policy and research outputs.

• IMFC (International Monetary and Financial Committee) meeting and communique: ministerial steering discussion on the global economy and IMF work, closed by an official statement.
• Development Committee meeting and communique: joint IMF-World Bank forum on development resources, closed by an official statement.
• Plenary session of the Boards of Governors (member representatives): autumn-only business meeting that passes resolutions and welcomes new members.
• Flagship report launches: staff presentations of growth, financial-stability and fiscal analyses with press briefings.
• Side programme: seminars, regional briefings, bilateral consultations and the Per Jacobsson Lecture on international finance.

On March 3, 2020 the meetings went fully virtual, with no delegates travelling, while committee meetings and flagship briefings ran remotely. The April 14, 2020 World Economic Outlook projected a sharp -3% global contraction in 2020 and 5.8% growth in 2021. Its table put United States output at 2.3% in 2019, -5.9% in 2020 and 4.7% in 2021, 7.9 points below the January 2020 Update. On October 9-15, 2023 Marrakech hosted the first Annual Meetings in Africa in 50 years, with thousands of delegates from 190 countries and 1200 media.

1. No formula: the publisher defines no calculation, weighting, seasonal adjustment or index level for this event.
2. Rotation illustration: if years 1 and 2 meet in Washington, year 3 meets in another member country, then the cycle returns.
3. Separate forecasts: growth percentages quoted around meetings come from the World Economic Outlook forecasting exercise, not from the meeting itself.