Monday Starts Fed Week. July 29 Is Already on the Calendar.

The room that prices waiting

Cash equity is closed today. The July 28-29 FOMC meeting is not. Markets still treat Wednesday's 2 p.m. ET decision window as the hinge for the week. Economists still lean hold. Sticky oil and a more hawkish policy cast keep the hike tail from going fully silent.

That is the whole Sunday job: mark the calendar before the open invents a story for you.

What is actually on the board

• Meeting: July 28-29 FOMC. Decision and statement typically hit Wednesday afternoon Eastern, with a press conference in the usual slot.
• Base case in the Street tape: hold in the current 3.5% to 3.75% funds range after a multi-meeting pause stretch.
• Live risk: oil, inflation language, and any signal that the next move is not automatically lower. July already taught growth and duration what a higher shared discount rate feels like.

You do not need a hero call on Sunday. You need levels and a plan for three paths: hold-and-dovish tone, hold-and-hawkish tone, and the lower-probability hike surprise.

How to use a closed Sunday

1. Write the paths. What you do if bonds rally hard, if they sell off, and if equities gap on language not the rate itself.
2. Separate oil from the Fed. Energy can move the inflation story even if the committee does nothing. Sticky crude is not a side quest this week.
3. Stop treating alternatives as a toy drawer. Classic cars, art, gold pitches, whatever. On a dark equity tape they are reminders that capital still prices scarcity somewhere. They are not a substitute for knowing your duration and equity beta into Wednesday.

Pocket change

Fed week starts when the calendar says it starts, not when cable finds a new chyron Monday morning. July 29 is three days away. Sunday is for levels, paths, and admitting the open will argue with whatever you did not write down.