Market Watch: week of 26 October 2026

Three major central banks meet in the same week: the Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan. Here are the official dates, the clock changes that affect the times, and how to tag your trades.

Not financial advice. This page is educational information about how to prepare and review trades around scheduled events. It does not tell you what to buy or sell, it does not predict any market move, and trading leveraged products can lose more than you expect. Dates and times come from the official sources linked on the page and can change, so confirm them before you rely on them.

The week beginning Monday 26 October 2026 is a dense one for anyone who trades dollar, euro or yen pairs, gold or indices. According to the official calendars, the Federal Reserve's rate-setting committee meets on 27 and 28 October, the European Central Bank's Governing Council meets on 28 and 29 October, and the Bank of Japan's Monetary Policy Meeting runs on 29 and 30 October. That puts three decisions on three consecutive days, from Wednesday to Friday.

This page lists those events with the official source for each, explains why the clock changes in Europe and the United States make the times tricky this particular week, and ends with a short routine for tagging and reviewing the trades you take around them. It does not say what any bank will decide or how any market will react, and it contains no trade ideas. From Monday, a short note for each weekday is added to the Daily notes section below, based on what the official sources published.

The week at a glance

Looking beyond this week, the same official sources list: the Bank of England announcement on Thursday 5 November, the US Employment Situation (jobs report) on Friday 6 November at 8:30 a.m., and US CPI on Tuesday 10 November at 8:30 a.m. The Fed's minutes for the October meeting are due three weeks after the decision according to its stated practice, which points to Wednesday 18 November, and the Fed's calendar did not list that date yet when we checked. Guides: FOMC days, ECB, BoE and BoJ days, NFP days and CPI days.

Clocks and time zones this week

Europe and the United States do not change their clocks on the same day. European clocks go back on Sunday 25 October 2026, the last Sunday of the month. US clocks go back on Sunday 1 November 2026, the first Sunday of November. During the week of 26 October the gap between New York and Europe is therefore one hour shorter than it normally is, and one hour shorter than it will be again from 1 November.

In practice, a 2:00 p.m. New York time statement on Wednesday 28 October falls at 18:00 UTC, because New York is still on daylight time, which is four hours behind UTC. The same 2:00 p.m. statement will fall at 19:00 UTC from Monday 2 November onward. If you plan around fixed local times, a plan that worked last week can be an hour out this week.

MetaTrader 5 stamps trades in the broker's server time, not in your time. Many brokers keep their server clock tied to New York, which means their offset to UTC changes on 1 November, but brokers differ, so check yours. The server time guide explains how to find the offset, and the session times converter does the conversion for the dates in this week.

US 10-year Treasury yield (published figure)

The US Treasury publishes daily par yield curve rates, including the 10-year. Its page says the rates are based on indicative bid-side quotations obtained by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York at or near 3:30 p.m. each trading day. When we checked on 31 October, the latest date shown was Friday 30 October, with a 10-year figure of 4.94 per cent. The Thursday 29 October figure was 4.98 per cent.

This is a record of a published number, not a view on where yields go next. Daily notes in the days ahead quote the Treasury's figure for each day as published, with a link. If you trade instruments that react to US rates, tag trades near rate events so you can review them later.

Sources: US Treasury daily par yield curve rates

The yen and Japan's official releases

The Bank of Japan is the central bank behind the yen. Its two-day meeting runs from Thursday 29 October to Friday 30 October according to its schedule page, with the decision at the end of the meeting. The page does not show a fixed time, so check the Bank's release on the day. We state no yen price or direction.

The Ministry of Finance publishes foreign exchange intervention operations in two releases. According to its page, the monthly release latest covers 27 August to 28 September 2026 and is dated 30 September 2026, and the quarterly release latest covers April to June 2026 and is dated 7 August 2026. We did not read any amounts into this page. Check the Ministry's page for the newest release, because the next monthly release has not been confirmed by us.

Sources: Bank of Japan meeting schedule; Ministry of Finance: intervention operations

International meeting dates

This section is meant to list only dates announced on an organiser's own page, such as G7, G20 or OPEC+ meetings. When we checked on 25 October, the official OPEC and G20 pages we tried could not be read (they returned an access error or a page that no longer exists), so we list no international meeting dates this week and do not fill the gap from memory. Check the organisers' own sites if you follow these meetings.

Daily notes

Each entry is added from the official sources linked under it, and it records what was published, not a view on where markets will go. Earlier days stay in place.

Tuesday 27 October

Tuesday 27 October was the first day of the two-day October meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee, the Federal Reserve body that sets US interest-rate policy. The Fed's meeting calendar lists the October meeting as 27-28 October, so the second day, Wednesday 28 October, is the day the decision is due.

The calendar page gives only the meeting dates for this meeting. It does not show a statement time, so if you plan to review trades around the decision, check the Fed's press releases page on the day rather than relying on a time quoted elsewhere. As the first day of a meeting, Tuesday carried no policy announcement from the committee, and we have no official release from that day to summarise.

For the Treasury's published figure, the daily par yield curve page shows a 10-year rate of 4.99 per cent for 27 October 2026. The previous published date, Monday 26 October, shows 5.00 per cent. These are numbers as published and carry no comment from us.

Journaling note: if your account traded on Tuesday, tag those trades as 'pre-FOMC' so that when you review the week you can compare them with trades taken after the decision. The point is to separate the days by event, not to predict anything about them.

Sources: Fed FOMC meeting calendar; US Treasury daily par yield curve rates

Wednesday 28 October

Wednesday 28 October was the second day of the October meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee, and the day the decision was due. According to the Federal Reserve's own release, published on 28 October at 2:00 p.m. EDT, the committee decided "to maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 3-3/4 to 4 percent."

The release records a vote of ten to two. It names two members who dissented, Lisa D. Cook and Beth M. Hammack, and says each favoured a quarter-point increase. We summarise the text as published and add no interpretation of what it means for any market.

For the Treasury's published figure, the daily par yield curve page shows a 10-year rate of 5.05 per cent for 28 October 2026. The figure for 27 October is shown as 4.99 per cent. These are numbers as published and carry no comment from us.

Journaling note: if you traded around the 2:00 p.m. New York release, check the times of your entries against the broker's server clock (see the page on MT5 server time) and tag the trades as 'FOMC day'. Then you can compare them with the pre-decision trades from Tuesday when you review the week.

Sources: Federal Reserve FOMC statement, 28 October 2026; US Treasury daily par yield curve rates

Thursday 29 October

Thursday 29 October was the day of the European Central Bank's monetary policy decision. The ECB's own press release, titled "Monetary policy decisions" and dated 29 October 2026, says the three key interest rates "will remain unchanged at 2.50%, 2.65% and 2.90% respectively." Those are the deposit facility, main refinancing operations and marginal lending facility rates. The ECB's press conference page lists the press conference for 14:45 CET that day.

It was also the first day of the Bank of Japan's two-day monetary policy meeting. A first meeting day comes with no decision; the BoJ's decision is due on the second day, Friday 30 October, and we will summarise it from the BoJ's own release once it is published.

For the Treasury's published figure, the daily par yield curve page shows a 10-year rate of 4.98 per cent for 29 October 2026; the figure for 28 October is shown as 5.05 per cent. These are numbers as published and carry no comment from us.

Journaling note: if you traded around the ECB release or press conference, remember that your entries are stamped on the broker's server clock, which can differ from Frankfurt time (see the page on MT5 server time). Tag those trades 'ECB day' so you can review them with the other central bank days of the week.

Sources: ECB monetary policy decisions, 29 October 2026; ECB press conference page; US Treasury daily par yield curve rates

Friday 30 October

Friday 30 October was the second and final day of the Bank of Japan's monetary policy meeting. The Bank's own Statement on Monetary Policy, dated 30 October 2026, says the Policy Board decided on an 8-1 majority vote that the Bank "will encourage the uncollateralized overnight call rate to remain at around 1.25 percent." The same statement records a unanimous decision to change the pace of its exchange-traded fund sales, to about 860 billion yen per year on a book-value basis, with the change implemented in January 2027.

We have not read the Bank's separate Outlook Report in detail and we say nothing about how markets or the yen responded. This note records only what the official statement states, with the link below.

For the Treasury's published figure, the daily par yield curve page shows a 10-year rate of 4.94 per cent for 30 October 2026; the figure for 29 October is shown as 4.98 per cent. These are numbers as published and carry no comment from us.

Journaling note: if you traded yen pairs around the decision, remember that your MT5 entries are stamped on the broker's server clock, not Tokyo time (see the page on MT5 server time). Tag those trades 'BoJ day' so you can review them alongside the other central bank days of the week.

Sources: Bank of Japan, Statement on Monetary Policy, 30 October 2026; US Treasury daily par yield curve rates

How to use this week in your journal

A calendar is only useful if you do something with it. For each event above that touches a pair you trade, decide before the day whether you will trade it, wait for the first moves to settle or stay out, and write that single line in your notes. Afterwards, tag the trades you took near the event so that you can compare them with ordinary trades once you have a few weeks of data. The guides explain the routine for each type of event: FOMC days, ECB, Bank of England and Bank of Japan days, NFP days and CPI days.

AI Trading Journal reads your closed trades from MetaTrader 5 on your Windows PC and saves them in a journal on your computer, with notes, ratings, tags and screenshots for each trade. The P&L calendar shows each day as a coloured tile with its result and trade count, so an event day is easy to find among the rest. The app does not know the event schedule and never places or changes trades. The dates here come from the official sources, and the tags come from you. To turn the event times into your broker's clock, read MT5 server time explained and use the session times converter.

Limits

• This page lists scheduled events and what was published. It does not forecast any decision or market move and it contains no trade ideas.
• Dates come from the official pages linked above at the time of writing. Schedules can change, so confirm them in the week you trade.
• Times that were not checked against an official page are described as usual or typical, and must be confirmed on the day.
• Nothing here is trading or investment advice.

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