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Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta

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Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta
The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta in 2006
The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta in 2006
Central bank of
Sixth District
Headquarters1000 Peachtree St NE
Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.
EstablishedMay 18, 1914 (112 years ago) (1914-05-18)
PresidentCheryl Venable (interim)
Websiteatlantafed.org
The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta is one of 12 regional banks that make up the Federal Reserve System

The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta (informally the Atlanta Fed and the Bank), is the sixth district of the 12 Federal Reserve Banks of the United States and is headquartered in midtown Atlanta, Georgia.

The Atlanta Fed covers the U.S. states of Alabama, Florida, and Georgia, the eastern two-thirds of Tennessee, the southern portion of Louisiana, and southern Mississippi as part of the Federal Reserve System.[1] Along with its Atlanta headquarters, the Bank operates five branches within the Sixth District, located in Birmingham, Jacksonville, Miami, Nashville, and New Orleans. These branches provide cash to banks, savings and loans, and other depository institutions; transfer money electronically; and clear millions of checks.[2]

In addition to supporting the U.S. financial system, the Atlanta Fed carries out the supervision and regulation of the banks operating within the sixth district. It also is a source of research and expertise for public and private decision makers within the district.

The Atlanta Fed is currently led by interim president and CEO Cheryl Venable, who assumed the role in 2026.

History

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The Federal Reserve Act, signed by President Woodrow Wilson on December 23, 1913, created the Federal Reserve System with the original objective of providing the nation with a safer, more flexible, and stable monetary and financial system.[3] A Reserve Bank Organization Committee selected Atlanta as the site for the Sixth District's Reserve Bank, announcing the decision in April 1914.[4] The bank opened for business on November 16, 1914, operating from rented space in Atlanta's Hurt Building.[3] In its early years, the Atlanta Fed focused on strengthening the cotton economy of the Sixth District and reducing the region's dependence on New York banks, while also working to enroll member banks in the Federal Reserve System.[3]

Enrolling banks in the Sixth District proved challenging. Many smaller state-chartered banks resisted joining, in part due to the Federal Reserve's requirement that checks be cleared at par value rather than with the exchange fees many southern banks customarily charged. This nonpar banking dispute persisted in the District long after it had been resolved elsewhere in the country.[5]

During the Great Depression, the Atlanta Fed worked to stabilize the regional banking system as dozens of banks across the Southeast closed. The bank assumed the assets of many failed institutions and made emergency loans to prevent wider economic damage.[6]

The 1950s brought expansion across the district, with branch offices in Jacksonville, Nashville, and Birmingham constructing new buildings to accommodate growing check volumes. In 1964, the Atlanta Fed built a new headquarters at the same Marietta Street site it had occupied since its early years.[3] The bank moved to its current headquarters at 1000 Peachtree Street NE in Midtown Atlanta in 2001.[7]

During the financial crisis of 2007–2008, which produced the worst recession in the United States since the Great Depression, the Atlanta Fed created its Regional Economic Information Network (REIN) in 2008 to more systematically gather data on economic conditions across the Southeast.[8]

The COVID-19 pandemic that began in 2020 caused severe economic disruption across the Sixth District, particularly affecting the leisure and hospitality industries concentrated in the region. The Atlanta Fed closely studied the pandemic's effects on the southeastern economy and produced research intended to inform the policy response.[6]

Responsibilities and functions

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Federal Reserve System's Sixth District

The Atlanta Fed's footprint covers the southeastern U.S., including the states of Alabama, Florida, and Georgia, 74 counties in the eastern two-thirds of Tennessee, 38 parishes of southern Louisiana, and 43 counties of southern Mississippi as part of the Federal Reserve System.[1]

The Atlanta Fed, along with the other 11 regional district banks, has three primary functions: assisting with monetary policy, operation of nationwide payment system, and administering bank supervision and regulation.[9] Its job is to decide the interest rates, and the president meets with other bank presidents and board members. The bank's board of directors makes recommendations on the levels of discount rates.

Secondarily, the Atlanta Fed is a source of research and expertise for public and private decision makers within the district. Researchers within the Atlanta Fed have innovated new tools to gauge the health of the macro U.S. economy, the two most notable are GDPNow[10] and the Wage Growth Tracker.[11] The Atlanta Fed's GDPNow is a "nowcasting" model for gross domestic product (GDP) growth that synthesizes the related GDP subcomponents with monthly source data prior to the formal GDP release by the Bureau of Economic Analysis, and is widely followed[12] by financial markets. The Wage Growth Tracker is a measure of the nominal wage growth of individuals, using microdata from the Current Population Survey from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Leadership

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Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta headquarters, designed by the 2011 Driehaus Prize winner Robert A. M. Stern

The bank is governed by a board of directors, which is drawn from the sixth district's business community, banks, and labor and consumer organizations, and makes recommendations every two weeks on the level of the discount rate, which is the rate at which the bank lends to commercial banks.

Following the retirement of Raphael Bostic on February 28, 2026, the bank is led by interim president and CEO Cheryl Venable, who also serves as first vice president and chief operating officer.[13]

Governors and presidents

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There have been 15 chief executive officers of the Atlanta Fed. The title of Reserve Bank chief executive officer was changed to president by the Banking Act of 1935.[14]

# CEO Life span Term start Term end
Governors
1 Joseph A. McCord 1857-1943 October 19, 1914 January 10, 1919
2 Max Wellborn 1862-1957 March 1, 1919 January 1, 1928
3 Eugene R. Black 1873-1934 January 13, 1928 May 19, 1933
- W.S. Johns - May 19, 1933 August 16, 1934
4 Eugene R. Black* 1873-1934 August 16, 1934 December 19, 1934
5 Oscar Newton* 1877-1939 January 10, 1935 —
Presidents
(5) Oscar Newton* 1877-1939 — February 13, 1939
6 Robert S. Parker* 1884-1941 February 18, 1939 March 28, 1941
7 William S. McLarin Jr. 1889-1960 May 9, 1941 March 1, 1951
8 Malcolm H. Bryan 1902-1967 April 1, 1951 September 30, 1965
9 Harold T. Patterson 1903-1971 October 1, 1965 January 31, 1968
10 M. Monroe Kimbrel 1903-1971 February 1, 1968 March 31, 1980
11 William F. Ford - August 1, 1980 October 1, 1983
12 Robert P. Forrestal 1931-2004 December 7, 1983 December 31, 1995
13 George C. "Jack" Guynn 1943- January 1, 1996 September 30, 2006
- Patrick K. Barron - October 1, 2006 February 28, 2007
14 Dennis P. Lockhart† 1947- March 1, 2007 February 28, 2017
- Marie C. Gooding - March 1, 2017 June 4, 2017
15 Raphael Bostic 1966- June 5, 2017 February 28, 2026
- Cheryl Venable - March 1, 2026 Incumbent
Denotes acting officeholder
† Stepped down due to reaching retirement age
* Died in office

Board of directors

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The following people are on the board of directors as of June 2026:[15]

Class A
Name Title Term expires
Rajinder P. Singh Chairman, President, and CEO, BankUnited Inc. 2026
William Y. Carroll Jr. President and CEO, SmartBank Inc. 2027
Cynthia N. Day President and CEO, Citizens Trust Bank 2028
Class B
Name Title Term expires
Michael E. Longo Former President and CEO, Hibbett Inc. 2026
G. Janelle Frost President and CEO, AMERISAFE Inc. 2027
Nicole B. Thomas Hospital President, Baptist Medical Center Jacksonville 2028
Class C
Name Title Term expires
Gregory A. Haile (Chair) CEO, Upwardly Global 2026
Ana M. Menendez CFO and Treasurer, Watsco Inc. 2027
James O. Etheredge (Deputy Chair) Former CEO, Accenture North America 2028

Headquarters

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The former Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta building at 104 Marietta Street NW in downtown Atlanta, now home to the State Bar of Georgia.

The Atlanta Fed is headquartered at 1000 Peachtree Street NE in Midtown Atlanta, occupying a ten-story building completed in 2001.[16] The former headquarters at 104 Marietta Street NW in downtown Atlanta is now occupied by the State Bar of Georgia.[17]

The current headquarters houses the Atlanta Monetary Museum, which features exhibits on the history of money, interactive multimedia exhibits on the Federal Reserve's role in the economy, and a view of the bank's automated vault and cash-processing areas.[18]

Branches

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See also

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References

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  1. 1 2 "Federal Reserve Bank Presidents: Dennis P. Lockhart". Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. January 28, 2009. Archived from the original on August 28, 2013. Retrieved February 19, 2009.
  2. ↑ "Branches". Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. Archived from the original on January 22, 2009. Retrieved February 19, 2009.
  3. 1 2 3 4 "Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta". New Georgia Encyclopedia. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  4. ↑ "Reserve Bank Organization Committee". Federal Reserve History. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  5. ↑ "The New Bank Meets "The World War"". Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  6. 1 2 "Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta". Federal Reserve History. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  7. ↑ "Building a New Chapter: The Move from Marietta Street to Peachtree Street". Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  8. ↑ "Financial Crises Lead to Financial Reforms". Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  9. ↑ "THE ATLANTA FED". FRB Atlanta. Retrieved July 23, 2017.
  10. ↑ "GDPNow". www.frbatlanta.org.
  11. ↑ "Wage Growth Tracker". Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  12. ↑ Burki, Shahid Javed (July 17, 2017). "What the Hamburg summit means to the world". The Express Tribune. Retrieved July 23, 2017.
  13. ↑ "Cheryl Venable". Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  14. ↑ "Former Atlanta Fed Presidents". www.frbatlanta.org. Retrieved July 22, 2017.
  15. ↑ "Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta Boards of Directors". Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  16. ↑ "The Atlanta Fed's Headquarters Building". Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  17. ↑ "Bar Offices". State Bar of Georgia. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
  18. ↑ "Atlanta Monetary Museum". Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. Retrieved June 22, 2026.
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33°46′57″N 84°23′7″W / 33.78250°N 84.38528°W / 33.78250; -84.38528 (Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta)

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