The Jackson Hole Symposium (Jackson Hole) convenes from 27 to 29 August under the title “Financial Innovation: Implications for Payments and Policy”, with Kevin Warsh (Kevin Warsh) delivering its keynote for the first time as Chair of the Federal Reserve — after removing Forward Guidance from the institution’s communications toolkit, and just 19 days before the September rate decision. This guide sets out four channels for reading the speech, drawing on his latest press conference, the July meeting minutes and data from our platform.
On the morning of Friday 28 August, Kevin Warsh will deliver his first keynote address at the Jackson Hole Symposium since becoming Chair of the Federal Reserve, 19 days before the 15–16 September meeting, alongside which the Summary of Economic Projections — SEP will be released. The speech comes as three pressures converge: the July meeting minutes — released on 19 August — showed that the committee held rates at 3.50%–3.75% by a 9 to 3 majority, with three dissenters calling for a quarter-point increase, and that “many participants” see tightening as potentially necessary if inflation does not fall from 3.4% towards target. Futures showed the probability of a September rate hike falling from 59.5% on 4 August to around 30% after two weeks of weak data. Even so, the probability of at least one rate hike before the end of 2026 remained around 63%; the market has deferred, not cancelled, the increase. The 30-year Treasury yield recorded its highest close since 2007 on 17 August at 5.31%, before the Treasury Department — not the Fed — intervened by doubling long-dated Treasury Buybacks. The paradox underpinning this research is that a chair who built his approach around “not signalling” must deliver the year’s most closely watched speech. We set out what Warsh actually said at his latest press conference — verbatim and based on our database — and what to watch in each of the speech’s four channels. Our historical price data show that the S&P 500’s movement on keynote day ranged from −3.37% to +1.52% over the past eight years.
Four channels through which to read the speech — and the channel deliberately switched off
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