H6: Revisions to the H.6 Statistical Release

As announced on March 15, 2020, the Board of Governors reduced reserve requirement ratios on net transaction accounts to 0 percent, effective March 26, 2020. This action eliminated reserve requirements for all depository institutions and rendered the regulatory distinction between reservable "transaction accounts" and nonreservable "savings deposits" unnecessary. On April 24, 2020, the Board removed this regulatory distinction by deleting the six-per-month transfer limit on savings deposits in Regulation D. This action resulted in savings deposits having the same liquidity characteristics as the transaction accounts currently reported as "Other checkable deposits" on Statistical Release H.6, "Money Stock Measures."Because of the change in their liquidity characteristics, savings deposits will be recognized as a type of transaction account on the H.6 statistical release. The Board will combine H.6 statistical release items "Savings deposits" and "Other checkable deposits" and report the resulting sum as "Other liquid deposits." Like other transaction accounts, other liquid deposits will be included in the M1 monetary aggregate. This action will increase the M1 monetary aggregate significantly while leaving the M2 monetary aggregate unchanged.At the same time next year, the Board will make a number of modifications to streamline the H.6 statistical release. Of particular note, the publication frequency of the release will change from weekly to monthly, and the release will contain only monthly average data. Weekly average, nonseasonally adjusted data will continue to be provided in the Board's Data Download Program, while weekly average, seasonally adjusted data will no longer be provided. Other release modifications will include (1) providing components of the monetary aggregates at a total industry level without a breakdown of components by banks and thrifts; (2) reporting only data used to construct the monetary aggregates, thereby eliminating items superfluous to that purpose; and (3) making the release available in only one format—HTML.The last weekly H.6 statistical release will be published on February 11, 2021. The first monthly H.6 statistical release containing the revisions previously discussed will be published on February 23, 2021, inclusive of retroactive updates to the data back to May 2020. For supplemental information on the revisions to the H.6 statistical release, see the Technical Q&As associated with the release.