Each month, we run the Moody's Analytics forecast models using the latest available historical data and pertinent assumptions. The output is called a vintage, in the same sense as the wine produced at a vineyard each season.
The vintage date is the month the forecast model was run. It appears on the Geography Wizard when picking a scenario, and on the associated scenario narrative document. It is not the date of the last historical point, which can vary among the series collected in the forecast product.
You can see the vintage date in three places:
1. Select the concept from its forecast catalog and open the Geography Wizard. The lower half of the box lists the available scenarios, and there is a parenthetical note alongside each checkbox. This is the vintage.
2. Examine the series in Mnemonic 411. On the Overview tab, look for the Updated row. In this timestamp, the month is the vintage.
3. Download the series in a basket, and include the optional field "Date of Last Update." Interpret as with Mnemonic 411.
Caveats:
1. Certain forecast products do not include scenarios, and so do not list vintages in the Geo Wizard. These are the U.S. Consumer, U.S. County, U.S. Employment, Output & Wages, and Housing Stock forecasts.
2. Some configurations of "custom series access" may obscure the dates. For example, if you subscribe to the Metro Forecast catalog but also to selected U.S.-level ("macro") forecasts, you will pick the U.S. series from the metro catalog, but the Geo Wizard will show the vintage of the metro forecast. That is, the Geo Wizard is keyed to the catalog, not to individual series.
3. Any change to a series will change its timestamp (as seen in options 2 and 3 above). We sometimes perform series maintenance (e.g., altering descriptions) between, and unrelated to, model updates.