Every year the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago hosts an economic symposium to discuss the previous year's economic performance and to present forecasts, thoughts, and ideas about how the U.S. economy will perform in the following year. Along with the symposium, the Chicago Fed has an annual forecasting challenge that is open to anyone attending the symposium (predominantly, Ph.D. economists, Ph.D. students, economics professors, professional economists, financial professionals, etc).

For this year, the forecast winners were announced on December 3rd, 2021, at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's 35th Annual Economic Outlook Symposium. Vignesh won the award in the category of "Best Trade Weighted Dollar Forecast".  

Vignesh Swarnam is a second-year student majoring in Economics with a minor in Mathematics. In the future, Vignesh is interested in pursuing future research and a graduate degree in Economics with a focus on understanding, forecasting, and formulating mitigatory policy solutions to economic crises.