The dot plot, decoded When the central bank releases its Summary of Economic Projections each quarter, Fed watchers focus obsessively on one part in particular: the so-called dot plot.

The Fed’s dot plot is a chart that records each Fed official’s projection for the central bank’s key short-term interest rate. The dot plot is updated every three months and is meant to ...

“The dots are not a great forecaster of future rate moves,” Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has warned, but every quarter the financial universe ponders the FOMC’s dot plot as though ...