Revision

The correction stage of a publication process that begins with a first print. Surveys return late, administrative records arrive after the deadline, and seasonal adjustment factors are re estimated, so the figure is restated on a published timetable. Some series publish a flash reading from part of the sample and a fuller reading a week or two later from the whole of it, and the gap between those two is a revision under another name.

Revisions come in more than one size. A routine revision adjusts one period as its inputs complete. An annual or benchmark revision reworks methodology, classifications and seasonal factors together and can restate the level of an entire history at once, which means figures quoted from either side of one are not comparable without restating them. The word final, where it appears in the name of an estimate, means final for that round rather than final in any lasting sense.

A calendar shows none of this. Two releases can carry the same importance marking, land at the same minute and differ completely in how much they are expected to move, because one is a first estimate of a period and the other is a restatement of one already traded. The market impact sits with the least complete version, and the most accurate version arrives after everyone has positioned on it.