Economy Matters

The Atlanta Fed

Raphael Bostic took office in June as the 15th president and chief executive officer of the Atlanta Fed. Bostic succeeded Dennis Lockhart, who retired in February. Before joining the Atlanta Fed, Bostic was the Judith and John Bedrosian Chair in Governance and the Public Enterprise at the Sol Price School of Public Policy at the University of Southern California.

Research and Monetary Policy

The 2017 Financial Markets Conference explored changes in regulation since the financial crisis and how they affect financial systems, markets, and institutions. The Center for Financial Innovation and Stability presented the conference. More than 160 attendees represented central banks, financial firms, Federal Reserve Banks, government agencies, and universities.

Research economists published papers and articles on a range of timely topics, including how governments can encourage innovation in a fiscally sustainable way; the shortcomings of economic models; the effect of unemployment on family welfare; how losing government-sponsored health insurance affects individuals’ financial well-being; how asset price movements across markets and countries affect prices in other markets and countries; and the role of poor health in rural labor force participation.

The Center for Human Capital Studies held its annual employment conference. Economists from prominent academic departments and central banks discussed a range of topics affecting the labor supply and wages. Economist Pat Higgins introduced several updates to the popular GDPNow forecasting tool.

The Center for Financial Innovation and Stability and Georgia State University cosponsored a conference exploring how financial regulation can keep pace with rapid technological advances and how monetary policy works to reduce the risk and costliness of future financial crises.

The Atlanta Fed's Center for Quantitative Economic Research and the International Monetary Fund cosponsored the center's second conference on China's economy, the world's second largest economy. The conference assembled experts from around the world to discuss a number of pressing issues facing China: financial reforms, saving behavior, political and social factors, innovations, and growth.

In October, the Community and Economic Development (CED) group established the Center for Workforce and Economic Opportunity. The center focuses on employment policies and labor market issues that affect low- and moderate-income individuals. It acts as a bridge between research and practice, connecting researchers, businesses, and policymakers with innovative approaches to creating economic opportunity through education and employment.

The Center for Workforce and Economic Opportunity introduced the Opportunity Occupations Monitor, a tool that tracks the prevalence of jobs that pay above the median wage in a state or metro area.

The Center for Workforce and Economic Opportunity also helped to stage a Federal Reserve System conference on workforce development in Austin, Texas, in October.

CED held a conference on heirs' property, a relatively obscure but critical factor in rural poverty. Academics and other experts presented research and discussed how to confront the myriad problems that result from heirs' properties, which are parcels of land inherited by the descendants of an owner who died without a proper will.

CED launched an initiative on the social determinants of health. Led by senior CED adviser Sameera Fazili, the project aims to spur discussion and, ultimately, collaboration among health care providers and community development practitioners in the region, particularly in underserved rural areas.

CED sponsored or cosponsored additional events, including a conference in Nashville on encouraging the development of mixed-income housing, a symposium exploring changes in the labor market and data sources used to study it, and an event examining regional food system investments to feed small-business development.

CED released an updated version of the Small City Economic Dynamism Index.

Federal Reserve Board Governor Lael Brainard visited Atlanta neighborhoods with CED and supervision and regulation team members. They met with community members and organizations to discuss local efforts to improve low- and moderate-income neighborhoods.

The Americas Center and Emory University held the sixth Atlanta Workshop on International Economics at Emory on December 8–9. Economists from the Federal Reserve System and leading universities presented and discussed new research related to exchange rates, trade, sovereign risk, and capital flows.

Mexican Ambassador Gerónimo Gutiérrez Fernandez spoke at an Atlanta Fed dinner that was cohosted by the Americas Center and the World Affairs Council of Atlanta. Ambassador Gutiérrez discussed the current state of U.S.-Mexican relations and the prospects for maintaining strong commercial and financial ties.

Distinguished economists Carmelo Mesa-Lago and Omar Everleny Pérez Villanueva visited the Atlanta Fed Research Department in February. Mesa-Lago is Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Economics and Latin American Studies at the University of Pittsburgh. His latest book, Voces de Cambio en el Sector No Estatal Cubano (Voices of Change in the Cuban Non-state Sector), was published in 2017. Pérez Villanueva is a professor in Havana.

Corporate Citizenship, Economic Education, and Public Outreach

More than 8,900 teachers participated in economic education workshops, webinars, and presentations. Attendance at the Atlanta Fed’s headquarters museum and the New Orleans Branch's museum rose 23 percent over 2016, to more than 15,000. Through its economic education programs, the team met a strategic objective to reach 75 percent of high schools in the Sixth District that are identified as inner city, majority-minority, or girls' schools.

Online programs of the economic education team had a strong year. Page views of the Classroom Economist, Extra Credit, Katrina's Classroom, and classroom lessons and activities rose 31 percent over 2016, to 690,975. Student enrollments in classroom videos edged up 1 percent, to more than 139,000.

In the ECONversations series of webcasts, Atlanta Fed experts discussed subjects including changes in e-commerce and the growth in mobile payments, effects of poor health on the workforce, and the Bank’s 2016 annual report on secular and cyclical changes in the economy over the last decade.

Public Affairs Forums brought leading authorities to Atlanta Fed offices to offer economic perspectives on public policy issues. Forums explored topics including opportunities from fintech, the effects of fiscal policies on the world, and the impact of income inequality on workers and consumers. New Atlanta Fed president Raphael Bostic spoke to business and community leaders at forums in Jacksonville, New Orleans, and Birmingham.

The Atlanta Fed Speakers Bureau facilitated 365 presentations in which employees shared research, data, and information with community groups and professional associations. The Speakers Bureau hosted 180 events for partner organizations.

Payments

The Retail Payments Office successfully implemented the second of three phased enhancements in an industrywide effort to expand expedited clearing and settlement of Automated Clearinghouse (ACH) transactions. With the change, many ACH debit transactions became eligible for same-day processing and settlement. Same-Day ACH represents the most significant change to the ACH network in more than 40 years.

The Retail Payments Office continued to enhance its risk-management offerings under its FedPayments Reporter Service, which provides detailed information on ACH transactions. The new product features include customized reporting to help institutions keep a pulse on their ACH processing activity, which helps mitigate risk and fraud.

Supervision and Regulation

In 2017, the Supervision and Regulation Division (S&R) continued to inform the banking industry and general public through a variety of forums, publications, and live events. The division produced the annual Banking Outlook Conference, "ViewPoint" articles, and ViewPoint Live! webcasts.

The S&R division also held the Southeast Bankers Outreach Forum, an event geared to community bankers that featured presentations and panel discussions on banking conditions, emerging risks, commercial real estate, and supervisory expectations.

The division's real estate specialists shared their expertise in several events, including an "Ask the Fed" series on regional commercial real estate conditions. Ask the Fed is a Federal Reserve System program for senior bankers and officials of state bankers' associations. The program addresses regulatory issues or supervisory guidance.

The Office of Minority and Women Inclusion

The Bank received external recognition for its commitment to diversity and inclusion in 2017. The Atlanta Fed was named to DiversityInc's list of top regional companies for diversity and earned a perfect score on the Human Rights Campaign's Corporate Equality Index—both for the fourth consecutive year.

The Bank added three new employee resource networks (ERNs) to further engage staff members in actively supporting diversity and inclusion. The three new ERNs included Honoring Our Latin Allies, Veterans Resource Network, and Working Families Network. The Bank now has eight ERNs.

Financial Statements

The Board of Governors and the Federal Reserve Banks annually prepare and release audited financial statements reflecting balances (as of December 31) and income and expenses for the year then ended.

Audit Statement

The Federal Reserve Board engaged KPMG to audit the 2017 combined and individual financial statements of the Reserve Banks.*

In 2017, KPMG also conducted audits of internal controls over financial reporting for each of the Reserve Banks. Fees for KPMG services totaled $6.8 million. To ensure auditor independence, the Board of Governors requires that KPMG be independent in all matters relating to the audits. Specifically, KPMG may not perform services for the Reserve Banks or others that would place it in a position of auditing its own work, making management decisions on behalf of the Reserve Banks, or in any other way impairing its audit independence. In 2017, the Bank did not engage KPMG for any non-audit services.

* In addition, KPMG audited the Office of Employee Benefits of the Federal Reserve System (OEB), the Retirement Plan for Employees of the Federal Reserve System (System Plan), and the Thrift Plan for Employees of the Federal Reserve System (Thrift Plan). The System Plan and the Thrift Plan provide retirement benefits to employees of the Board, the Federal Reserve Banks, the OEB, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Each year, the Office of Minority and Women Inclusion (OMWI) at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta provides a congressional report summarizing the office's actions with regard to the requirements under Section 342 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010. This report highlights the work OMWI performed in the previous year to take the affirmative steps that the Dodd-Frank Act addresses—specifically, ensuring workforce and supplier diversity, as well as advancing financial literacy in inner-city, majority/minority, and girls' schools. The Atlanta Fed undertakes these efforts in the Sixth Federal Reserve District.

The Atlanta Fed's annual reports highlight the work of the Atlanta Fed over the preceding year. Reports before 2012 were printed publications, and many of these are available online on our website in PDF. Beginning in 2011, we have published online-only annual reports. These contain topical essays, dynamic charts, and videos and imagery, as well as links to the Bank's financial statements and lists of our current directors and officers.

About the Atlanta Fed

The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta is one of 12 regional Reserve Banks in the United States that, with the Board of Governors in Washington, DC, make up the Federal Reserve System—the nation's central bank. Since its establishment by an act of Congress in 1913, the Federal Reserve System's primary role has been to foster a sound financial system and a healthy economy. To advance this goal, the Atlanta Fed helps formulate monetary policy, supervises banks and bank and financial holding companies, and provides payment services to depository institutions and the federal government. Through its six offices in Atlanta, Birmingham, Jacksonville, Miami, Nashville, and New Orleans, the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta serves the Sixth Federal Reserve District, which comprises Alabama, Florida, and Georgia, and parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee.

Annual Report Staff

Branches & Offices