FRED Analyzer

Fetch any FRED economic time series and analyze macro trends — inflation, money supply, employment, yields, credit spreads — all from a single command.

py fred_analyzer.py --api-key YOUR_KEY --series CPIAUCSL:CPI PCEPI:PCE --start 2018-01-01 --plot

Features

• Any FRED series — CPI, PCE, M2, nonfarm payrolls, Treasury yields, corporate bond spreads, money supply, and 800,000+ more
• Multi-series merge — combine any number of series into one DataFrame (outer-joined on date)
• Spread calculator — subtract a baseline series (e.g., 10Y Treasury) to compute credit spreads
• Missing data handled — NaN for missing dates, bad series IDs reported without crashing
• Plot flag — optional matplotlib chart with --plot

Setup

pip install fredapi pandas matplotlib

Get a free FRED API key: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/docs/api/api_key.html

Usage

# Compare CPI vs PCE inflation
py fred_analyzer.py --api-key YOUR_KEY --series CPIAUCSL:CPI PCEPI:PCE --start 2018-01-01

# Money supply M0, M1, M2
py fred_analyzer.py --api-key YOUR_KEY --series BOGMBASE:M0 M1SL:M1 M2SL:M2 --start 2015-01-01 --plot

# Credit spreads: AAA and BBB vs 10Y Treasury
py fred_analyzer.py --api-key YOUR_KEY --series BAMLC0A0CMEY:AAA BAMLC0A4CBBBEY:BBB DGS10:10Y_Treasury --baseline 10Y_Treasury --start 2020-01-01 --plot

# Nonfarm payrolls
py fred_analyzer.py --api-key YOUR_KEY --series PAYEMS:Nonfarm_Payrolls --start 2018-01-01

# High yield credit spreads (OAS)
py fred_analyzer.py --api-key YOUR_KEY --series BAMLH0A0HYM2:HY_OAS DGS10:10Y_Treasury --start 2022-01-01

# Custom: any series IDs
py fred_analyzer.py --api-key YOUR_KEY --series DGS2:2Y_Treasury DGS10:10Y_Treasury T5YIE:5Y_BE_Inflation --start 2020-01-01

Parameters

Argument	Required	Description
--api-key	Yes	FRED API key
--series	Yes	Space-separated ID:Name pairs
--baseline	No	Name to subtract for spread columns
--start	No	Start date (e.g., 2020-01-01)
--plot	No	Show matplotlib chart
--rows	No	Tail rows to print (default: 10)

As a Python Library

from fred_analyzer import fetch_series

df = fetch_series("YOUR_API_KEY", [
    {"id": "CPIAUCSL", "name": "CPI"},
    {"id": "PCEPI", "name": "PCE"},
], start_date="2020-01-01")

print(df.tail())

As an OpenCode Skill

The .opencode/skills/fred-analyzer/SKILL.md file lets AI agents use this tool via natural language queries like:

• "Pull CPI and PCE from 2018 to compare inflation"
• "Analyze AAA and BBB credit spreads vs 10Y Treasury"
• "Fetch M0, M1, M2 money supply from 2015"

Common FRED Series IDs

Series	ID	Description
CPI	CPIAUCSL	Consumer Price Index, All Items
PCE	PCEPI	Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index
M2	M2SL	M2 Money Supply
M1	M1SL	M1 Money Supply
Monetary Base	BOGMBASE	Monetary Base (M0)
Nonfarm Payrolls	PAYEMS	Total Nonfarm Payrolls
10Y Treasury	DGS10	10-Year Treasury Yield
2Y Treasury	DGS2	2-Year Treasury Yield
5Y Treasury	DGS5	5-Year Treasury Yield
AAA Corp Yield	BAMLC0A0CMEY	ICE BofA AAA Effective Yield
BBB Corp Yield	BAMLC0A4CBBBEY	ICE BofA BBB Effective Yield
HY OAS	BAMLH0A0HYM2	ICE BofA High Yield OAS
Fed Funds Rate	FEDFUNDS	Effective Federal Funds Rate
Unemployment	UNRATE	Civilian Unemployment Rate
GDP	GDP	Gross Domestic Product

Data Source

All data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis FRED API — 800,000+ economic time series, free and public.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/