Midterms 2026 Stock Market: 8 Numbers Before Nov 3

FOMC Alerts · October 27, 2026

For the midterms 2026 stock market picture, start with the calendar. The Fed decides before voters do: the FOMC statement is out Wed Oct 28 at 2:00 PM ET and Chair Warsh speaks at 2:30, six days before Election Day on Tue Nov 3. The S&P 500 goes into both events up about 13% this year (+12.81% price return through Tue Oct 27) and 1.2% below its Oct 6 record close. Options traders, per Cboe data, are pricing a small election reaction. The bigger scheduled risk this week is the Fed.

Below are the last official numbers before the vote, what the Fed is expected to do with them, and what election weeks have looked like for stocks. Political claims are attributed; we don’t take sides.

What are the last economic numbers before the midterms?

September data is the final official read before Nov 3. The October jobs report lands Fri Nov 6 and October CPI on Tue Nov 10, both after the vote. AP’s Oct 26 Fact Focus walked through the figures voters are weighing; we rebuilt the core ones from the agencies’ own data.

Payroll averages are monthly changes in the current BLS vintage. GDP averages are simple averages of quarterly annualized rates.

Two more reports arrive before the vote: Q3 GDP (advance) and September PCE inflation on Thu Oct 29 at 8:30 AM ET (BEA), and the Q3 Employment Cost Index on Fri Oct 30 at 8:30 AM ET. The Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow model put Q3 at 3.5% on Oct 20. Our Q3 GDP and PCE preview covers Thursday.

Is inflation still above the Fed’s 2% target?

Yes, and it has been for more than five and a half years. BLS said September CPI rose 0.6% on the month and 3.7% over the year, up from 3.4% in August. Gasoline jumped 9.1% and made up more than half of the monthly increase. Core CPI, which leaves out food and energy, was 2.6% over the year.

By our count from BLS data, headline CPI has been above 2% every published month since March 2021. The Fed’s own target gauge, PCE inflation, has been above 2% since March 2021 as well and stood at 3.4% in August, with core PCE at 3.0% (BEA). Morgan Stanley’s line, as quoted by Currency News UK on Oct 26, is “nearly six years”; the data says a little over five and a half. Its outlook on where that leads the Fed was blunt: “The risks are in the direction of a Fed that ultimately needs to hike rates more than we expect.” Reuters attributed the same sentence to the bank’s chief US economist, Michael Gapen, in its Oct 20 economists’ poll.

How are jobs and wages doing before the election?

Hiring has slowed while unemployment has stayed in a narrow band. The September jobs report showed a 4.2% unemployment rate, up from 4.1% in August, which BLS described as changed little. The rate has held between 4.1% and 4.3% since March. Payrolls rose 29,000 in September.

Average hourly earnings were up 3.0% from a year earlier, below 3.7% CPI inflation, so pay is trailing prices on that comparison. We go through that gap in are wages keeping up with inflation.

Growth has been uneven: quarterly real GDP readings since the start of 2025 ran 0.1%, 4.0%, 3.9%, 0.2%, 2.5% and 2.2% annualized (BEA). On the fiscal side, corporate income tax receipts fell about $70 billion, or 15.6%, in fiscal 2026 to $381.4 billion, per the Treasury’s monthly statement; CBO points to larger investment deductions under the 2025 reconciliation act.

Is the 10-year Treasury yield the highest since 2002?

The 2026 peak was. The 10-year closed at 5.31% on Oct 5, its highest since May 2002, and has since eased to 4.99% (Tue Oct 27, U.S. Treasury). It closed at or above 5% on 25 trading days from Sep 15 through Oct 26, a level it had not closed at or above between July 2007 and this year.

Borrowers feel it directly. The 30-year mortgage rate averaged 7.32% in the week to Oct 22, against 6.19% a year earlier and a 2026 high of 7.4% earlier this month (Freddie Mac). For the drivers behind the move, see why the 10-year Treasury yield is rising.

How does the stock market react to midterms, and what’s priced for 2026?

Historically, volatility has risen less after midterms than after presidential elections, and this year options are pricing less than the midterm norm. Per Traders Magazine, citing Cboe data, forward volatility points to a rise of slightly more than 1% on Wed Nov 4, the day after the vote, against a historical midterm average closer to 4% and about 7% after presidential elections. Cboe’s Ed Tom tied that to an expected divided government after the vote: “That’s why markets aren’t pricing in much of a change for the midterms.”

The recent record is mixed. In our calculation from Cboe closes, the S&P 500 moved +0.37% (2010), +0.57% (2014), +2.12% (2018) and -2.08% (2022) in the session after midterm Election Day. The VIX fell the day after in three of those four. Four cases describe what happened; they don’t set odds for 2026.

Has a Fed meeting right before a midterm moved stocks?

Of the last four midterms, two had a Fed decision six days before Election Day, as this year does, and the two went opposite ways. In 2014 (decision Oct 29, election Nov 4), the S&P 500 rose 1.94% from the close before the decision to the close the day after the election. In 2022 (Nov 2, Nov 8), it fell 2.79% over the same window. Our calculation from Cboe closes. Two cases with opposite signs are anecdote, not pattern. (2016 had the same six-day gap, but it was a presidential election.)

What comes after this week’s Fed decision?

This week. The Fed meets Tue Oct 27 and Wed Oct 28, with the statement at 2:00 PM ET Wednesday and Chair Warsh’s press conference at 2:30 PM ET. The last meeting of 2026 runs Dec 8 to 9, with the decision on Wed Dec 9 and new economic projections, which October doesn’t have (Federal Reserve). So the vote falls between two Fed decisions: six days after October’s and about five weeks before December’s. Our FOMC meeting schedule 2026 lists every date and statement time.

What will the Fed do on Wednesday, and what about December?

A hold is priced for Wednesday, with a hike priced by December. The target range has been 3.75% to 4.00% since the Sep 16 hike. Our calculation from fed funds futures using CME’s method puts a hold on Oct 28 at 91.1% and a 25bp hike at 8.9%. After the Dec 9 meeting, it puts 76.1% on 4.00% to 4.25% (one hike), 7.2% on two hikes and 16.7% on no change, so 83.3% for at least one hike by year-end. These come from delayed quotes taken about 4:10 PM ET on Tue Oct 27; a half-tick move in the December contract shifts the December figure by roughly 2 to 3 points either way.

There are no new projections at this meeting, so the statement and Warsh’s answers carry the signal. Our explainer on how fed funds futures turn into hike odds shows the math.

What does this mean for SPX 0DTE this week?

• Energy: Three scheduled catalysts in a week: the Fed at 2:00 and 2:30 PM ET Wednesday, GDP and PCE at 8:30 AM ET Thursday, then the vote on Tuesday with the first full-session reaction Wednesday Nov 4. Markets keep normal hours on Election Day.
• Premium: Check the expected move before each event, and see the FOMC implied move by expiry for Wednesday. The VIX was near 17.5 at Tuesday’s close (Oct 27), down from 18.39 Monday. Per Cboe data, the priced post-election rise in volatility is below the midterm average, so a larger-than-usual reaction would not be in the price.
• Structure: Two event types, two different risks. Keep short premium defined-risk, such as an iron condor with max loss known at entry, and size so a wing tag is survivable.
• Plan, don’t predict: Write down the hold-plus-December-guidance case and the no-guidance case before 2:00 PM ET Wednesday, and treat Nov 4 as its own event. We aren’t calling either.

Numbers are our calculations from BLS, BEA, Treasury, Cboe, Freddie Mac and Treasury MTS public data pulled Oct 26, 2026, about 6:45 to 7:15 AM ET, with the 10-year, S&P 500, VIX and odds refreshed Oct 27 about 4:10 to 4:25 PM ET; odds are our calculation from fed funds futures using CME’s method.

Related reading: Fed meeting this week: odds and times · Why the 10-year yield is rising · FOMC Alerts hub · All FOMC Alerts coverage

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