NQ Futures · 1-Minute Data · 2008–2026
For every week containing a high-impact news event, which weekday made the week's High and Low — and in which trading session. All times NY ET.
Each bar is a weekday. The taller the bar, the more often the week's highest price landed on that day when this event happened that week.
Same idea, but for the week's lowest price — which day it landed on most often.
Beyond which day, this shows which part of the trading day (session) the High/Low actually printed in. Asia = overnight, London = pre-market, New York = the main US session, Dead = after-close lull.
Same High/Low-by-day idea as above, but split out by calendar month instead of by event type, so you can see if the pattern shifts depending on time of year (e.g. a quiet December vs. a volatile September). Highlighted cell in each row = that month's most common day.
The Federal Reserve's rate-setting committee meets 8 times a year and announces, at 2:00pm ET, whether it's raising, cutting, or holding the benchmark interest rate. It's followed by a live Powell press conference where a single offhand phrase about "the path forward" can swing NQ hundreds of points in minutes. March, June, September, and December meetings also include the "dot plot" — the Fed's own rate forecast — which tends to move markets even harder than the decision itself.
The U.S. jobs report, released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics at 8:30am ET on (normally) the first Friday of the month. It shows how many jobs the economy added or lost, the unemployment rate, and wage growth. A number far from consensus resets the market's whole read on how "hot" the economy is running — which feeds straight back into what the Fed is expected to do next, making it one of the most reliably volatile mornings of the month.
The headline U.S. inflation print, also from the BLS, released around the 2nd–3rd week of each month. It measures how much prices for everyday goods rose or fell versus a year ago. This is the number the Fed watches most closely when deciding rate policy, so a CPI surprise (hot or cold) can immediately reprice how many cuts or hikes the market expects — and NQ, being rate-sensitive tech, tends to move hard on it.
Released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis on the last Friday of the month, PCE is technically the Fed's preferred inflation gauge — more so than CPI — because it accounts for how consumers substitute cheaper goods when prices rise. It usually moves markets less violently than CPI since it lands after CPI has already set expectations, but it's still a direct input into Fed thinking and can matter a lot when it disagrees with what CPI showed.
An annual, invite-only economic policy conference hosted by the Kansas City Fed in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, every late August. The Fed Chair's keynote speech there has, on multiple occasions, been used to signal a major shift in policy direction well before an actual FOMC meeting — making it a genuine surprise-risk event despite not being a scheduled rate decision.
Tariff announcements, major policy speeches, election nights, and inaugurations tied to Donald Trump's terms in office (2017–2021, 2025–present). Unlike the other categories, these have no fixed schedule — they land as off-calendar headline shocks, often outside regular trading hours, which is why (per the data above) the week's Low during these events forms disproportionately in the Asia session versus any other category tracked here.