US Federal Open Market Committee decision — 16 September 2026

The rate-setting meeting of the United States central bank. The statement is released at 14:00 Eastern — 23:30 IST in the American summer and 00:30 the following morning in winter. Both are after the Indian close, so the Indian session that reacts is the NEXT one, and the desk measures it there.

Who decides

Twelve voting members: the seven governors of the Federal Reserve Board, the president of the New York Fed, and four of the remaining eleven regional presidents on a rotation. Eight scheduled meetings a year, four of which carry the committee's projections.

What moves

Indian index options rarely react to the rate. What travels is the dollar and the American rate path: the rupee, foreign portfolio flows, and the overnight gap that GIFT Nifty prices before the Indian bell. That is why this class's base rate is measured on the session AFTER the announcement.

What it is not

It is not an Indian event, and the reaction reaching NIFTY has passed through the dollar and through an overnight session first. A base rate here describes the Indian session that followed, not the American one that produced it.

going into the last 44 of these, the option market was asking about 0.9% by expiry and the market travelled about 0.6% — the move was the larger of the two about 45 times in 100.

half of them landed between 0.26% and 0.94% either way