FRED

Provides access to FRED economic data via MCP with tools to fetch series, search, and retrieve metadata.

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4 months ago

First Indexed

2 months ago

Catalog Refreshed

Documentation & install

Readme and setup notes from the catalogue, plus a client-ready config you can copy for your MCP host.

Installation

Add the following to your MCP client configuration file.

Configuration

View docs

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "shawndrake2-mcp-fred": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": [
        "/path/to/fred/dist/index.js"
      ],
      "env": {
        "FRED_API_KEY": "YOUR_API_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

You can run the FRED MCP Server to access a rich set of Federal Reserve Economic Data through an MCP client. This server exposes time series, metadata, and category data from the FRED database, enabling you to query and explore macroeconomic indicators directly from your MCP workflow.

How to use

Start by launching the MCP server in your environment. Use an MCP client to call the available tools, such as fetching a time series by its FRED ID, searching for series by keywords, or retrieving metadata about a specific series. You can obtain data like GDP, unemployment, inflation, and more, and you can also query state-level data when needed.

How to install

Prerequisites: make sure you have Node.js installed on your system. You will also need access to a valid FRED API key for data retrieval.

Create the MCP configuration for the FRED server using the provided setup snippet.

{
  "fred": {
    "command": "node",
    "args": ["/path/to/fred/dist/index.js"],
    "env": {
      "FRED_API_KEY": "your-api-key"
    }
  }
}

Configuration

The MCP server configuration exposes a single local (stdio) server that runs a Node.js entry point. Supply your FRED API key through the environment variable FRED_API_KEY.

Example environment variable to set in your environment before starting the server:

export FRED_API_KEY=your-api-key

Notes and usage details

You can access multiple tools through the MCP client, including retrieving time-series data, searching for series by keywords, getting metadata for a series, listing popular series, exploring category data, and obtaining recent data releases. The system supports standard date ranges and limits per request to tailor data volume.

Security and keys

Keep your FRED API key secure and do not expose it in shared configurations. Use environment variable management to inject the key at runtime and avoid hard-coding sensitive values.

Troubleshooting

If you encounter authentication errors, verify that FRED_API_KEY is correctly set in the environment of the running process. Check that the path to the compiled FRED entry point is accurate and that Node.js is available on the host.

Available tools

get_series

Fetch time series data for a FRED series ID with optional start/end dates, limit, and sort order.

search_series

Search FRED series by keywords and return matching series IDs.

get_series_info

Retrieve metadata about a specific FRED series, including title, units, frequency, and notes.

list_popular

Return a list of commonly used FRED series IDs with descriptions.

get_category_series

Get all series within a specified FRED category ID.

get_releases

Fetch recent data releases to identify the freshest data.

get_state_data

Shortcut to access state-level economic indicators like unemployment, income, GDP, or population.