It’s hard to believe, but it was only 16 years ago that the FOMC began releasing any information immediately after its meeting. Before 1994, the public wasn’t formally made aware of the FOMC’s decisions until the minutes were published many weeks later.
Instead, market participants would closely watch the actions of the New York Fed’s trading desk and would then infer when policy changes were made. On February 4, 1994, Chairman Greenspan released the first post-meeting statement describing an FOMC policy action. At that point, the statement was the Chairman’s alone, and there were no promises about future statements being released.