# BIS Central Bank Policy Rates Scraper (`acquistion-automation/bis-policy-rates-scraper`) Actor

Collects central bank policy rates from the BIS statistics warehouse. Returns each observation as a flat row with date, rate value, and country code. Filter by BIS country code and daily or monthly frequency.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/acquistion-automation/bis-policy-rates-scraper.md
- **Developed by:** [Acquisition Automation Co.](https://apify.com/acquistion-automation) (community)
- **Categories:** Automation, Integrations, Business
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

from $7.50 / 1,000 results

This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events.
Since this Actor supports Apify Store discounts, the price gets lower the higher subscription plan you have.

Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/actors/running/actors-in-store.md#pay-per-event

## What's an Apify Actor?

An Actor is a serverless cloud program that runs on the Apify platform. It has two run modes.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.

Apify vocabulary and the platform model are defined once, in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md.

## How to integrate an Actor?

If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.

Do not guess an integration path. Every one of them is in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md: the Apify MCP server, Agent Skills with the Apify CLI, the JavaScript and Python clients, the REST API, and the account-free path for an agent with no human to sign in. It also carries the rule on stating cost before the first paid run.

For examples already wired to this Actor's own input schema, see the [API](#api) section below.

Each client library has reference documentation the quickstart does not restate: [JavaScript/TypeScript](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md) (`npm install apify-client`) and [Python](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md) (`pip install apify-client`).

# README

![Acquisition Automation Co. Search less. Close more.](https://api.apify.com/v2/key-value-stores/AOdPHdOpeDpzEPS5f/records/banner.jpg)

## 🏦 BIS Central Bank Policy Rates Scraper

> **The policy rate of any central bank the BIS tracks, one observation per row, back to the 1950s.** Pick a country code and daily or monthly frequency, and the Actor returns date, rate and country as a flat table. No API key, no registration, no stitching spreadsheets.

The Bank for International Settlements publishes the `WS_CBPOL` series, the official policy rate for around 40 economies. Reading it by hand means clicking through country pages and merging downloads. This Actor pulls the series you ask for and writes each observation into a dataset you can open in Excel or load into a model.

| Who uses it | What they use the series for |
|---|---|
| 💼 Acquisition entrepreneurs and search funds | Checking what the base rate on acquisition debt has done, and where it sat when a comp was priced |
| 📊 Deal analysts | Anchoring a discount rate or a debt schedule to a published number rather than a recollection |
| 🌍 Cross border buyers | Comparing the cost of money in the target's country against their own before modelling |
| 📈 Economists and quants | Building a single panel of global policy rates with one schema across every country |

### 📋 What it does

> 💡 **Why it matters:** the rate on an acquisition loan moves with the central bank. A dated series of the base rate is the cheapest way to sanity check what a seller's historical interest expense should have been.

- 🌍 **Filters by BIS country code.** `US`, `GB`, `JP`, `XM` for the euro area, or leave it empty for every country the BIS covers.
- 📅 **Daily or monthly.** `D` gives the rate on each business day, `M` gives the monthly series.
- 🔢 **You cap the run** with a single number, so a test costs cents.
- 🧱 **One schema for every country**, so several runs stack into one table without cleaning columns.
- 📦 **One row per observation**, with the country and frequency repeated on each row for easy filtering.
- 💾 **Exports to CSV, Excel, JSON or XML**, from the run page or the API.

### 📊 Output

Every observation is one flat row.

| Field | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
| 🌍 `country` | string | BIS country code for the series, for example `US` |
| 📅 `frequency` | string | `D` for daily or `M` for monthly, as requested |
| 🗓 `date` | string | Observation date. `1954-07` on a monthly series, a full date on a daily one |
| 💹 `policy_rate` | number | The policy rate in percent, for example `1.44` |
| 🏛 `source` | string | Always `BIS WS_CBPOL`, the series the row came from |
| 🕒 `scrapedAt` | string | ISO timestamp of collection |
| ⚠️ `error` | string | `null` on a normal row |

#### Example rows

```json
{
  "country": "US",
  "frequency": "M",
  "date": "1954-07",
  "policy_rate": 0.25,
  "source": "BIS WS_CBPOL",
  "scrapedAt": "2026-09-14T16:11:34.935Z",
  "error": null
}
```

```json
{
  "country": "US",
  "frequency": "M",
  "date": "1954-08",
  "policy_rate": 1.44,
  "source": "BIS WS_CBPOL",
  "scrapedAt": "2026-09-14T16:11:35.032Z",
  "error": null
}
```

### ✨ Why choose this Actor

| | What you get |
|---|---|
| **The official series** | Rates come from the BIS warehouse, not from a news article or a screenshot. |
| **No credentials** | Reads the public BIS data endpoint. No registration, no token to rotate. |
| **Seven fields, every country** | The same columns whether you pull `US` or all 40, so the rows stack. |
| **Decades of history** | Series often begin in the 1940s or 1950s, so a long rate cycle fits in one export. |
| **You pay per row** | No subscription. A ten row test costs under a dime. |

### 🚀 How to use it

1. [Create a free Apify account](https://console.apify.com/sign-up). New accounts start with $5 of credit.
2. Open the Actor and select **Try for free**.
3. Set `country` to a BIS code, or clear it to collect every country.
4. Set `frequency` to `M` or `D`, and `maxItems` to cap the run.
5. Select **Start**, then export from the **Dataset** tab as CSV, Excel, JSON or XML.

A first run:

```json
{
  "country": "US",
  "frequency": "M",
  "maxItems": 10
}
```

A full monthly history for the euro area:

```json
{
  "country": "XM",
  "frequency": "M",
  "maxItems": 1000
}
```

### ⚙️ Input

| Field | Required | Description |
|---|---|---|
| `country` | No | BIS country code, for example `US`, `XM` for the euro area, `GB`, `JP`. Leave empty for all |
| `frequency` | No | `D` for daily or `M` for monthly. Default `M` |
| `maxItems` | No | Maximum observations to collect per run. Default 10 |

### 💰 Pricing

Pay per result. No subscription, and no Apify platform usage on top.

| Apify plan | Free | Bronze | Silver | Gold | Platinum | Diamond |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Per observation row | $0.0085 | $0.0082 | $0.0078 | $0.0075 | $0.0075 | $0.0075 |

| Rows collected | Cost on the Free plan |
|---|---|
| 100 | $0.85 |
| 1,000 | $8.50 |
| 10,000 | $85.00 |

**Free plan runs** return up to 10 rows as a preview. Any paid Apify plan lifts that to 1,000,000 per run.

### 🔌 Integrate with any app

The dataset is available through the Apify API as soon as the run finishes. Use `run-sync-get-dataset-items` for a one-shot call, webhooks to trigger what happens next, or the Make, Zapier, Airbyte and LangChain integrations listed on the Actor page.

### 🤖 Use with an AI agent

Give an agent live access to the series over the Model Context Protocol:

```bash
claude mcp add --transport http apify "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=acquistion-automation/bis-policy-rates-scraper"
```

Then ask it in plain language for a country's policy rate history and have it read the result back.

### ❓ Frequently asked questions

**The first rows I got are from the 1950s. Where is the current rate?**
The series is returned oldest first, so a small `maxItems` stops in the early history. Raise `maxItems` until the run reaches the present, then sort by `date` descending.

**Which country codes work?**
The BIS uses short codes such as `US`, `GB`, `JP` and `XM` for the euro area. They are case sensitive. Leaving `country` empty collects every country the BIS covers.

**Why did I get fewer rows than `maxItems`?**
`maxItems` is a cap, not a target. The run also stops when the BIS data for that country and frequency is exhausted.

**Why does the daily series have gaps?**
The BIS publishes daily policy rates for business days. Weekends and national holidays have no observation.

**Do I need a BIS account?**
No. The Actor reads the same public endpoint that serves the BIS statistics portal.

**What can I export?**
CSV, Excel, JSON and XML from the run page, or JSON straight from the API.

### 🔗 More from Acquisition Automation Co.

- [DANE Colombia Statistics Scraper](https://apify.com/acquistion-automation/dane-colombia-statistics-scraper)
- [MLIT Japan Real Estate Prices Scraper](https://apify.com/acquistion-automation/mlit-japan-real-estate-prices-scraper)
- [SAM.gov Contract Opportunities Scraper](https://apify.com/acquistion-automation/sam-gov-contracts-scraper)
- [IRS Exempt Organizations Scraper](https://apify.com/acquistion-automation/irs-eo-master-file-scraper)
- [BizBuySell Scraper](https://apify.com/acquistion-automation/bizbuysell-scraper)

### About Acquisition Automation Co.

We build automation for people buying businesses. The repetitive part of an acquisition search, checking listings, pulling public records, tracking owners and assets, is work a machine should do, so the buyer's time goes into judging deals instead of collecting them.

We add new Actors regularly. If there is a source you need and do not see here, tell us.

### 🆘 Support

Open an issue in the **Issues** tab of this Actor with your run ID, the input you used, and what you expected to get back.

### ⚠️ Disclaimer

This Actor is independent and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by the Bank for International Settlements. It collects only publicly available data. You are responsible for using that data in compliance with the source's terms of service and applicable law.

# Actor input Schema

## `country` (type: `string`):

BIS country code (e.g. US, XM for euro area, GB, JP). Leave empty for all.

## `frequency` (type: `string`):

Daily or monthly series.

## `maxItems` (type: `integer`):

Maximum number of policy rates to collect per run.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "country": "US",
  "frequency": "M",
  "maxItems": 10
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `results` (type: `string`):

No description

# API

You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.

## JavaScript example

```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
    token: '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>',
});

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {
    "country": "US",
    "maxItems": 10
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("acquistion-automation/bis-policy-rates-scraper").call(input);

// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.dir(item);
});

// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs

```

## Python example

```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient

# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_API_TOKEN>")

# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = {
    "country": "US",
    "maxItems": 10,
}

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("acquistion-automation/bis-policy-rates-scraper").call(run_input=run_input)

# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print(f"💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}")
for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items():
    print(item)

# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start

```

## CLI example

```bash
echo '{
  "country": "US",
  "maxItems": 10
}' |
apify call acquistion-automation/bis-policy-rates-scraper --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,acquistion-automation/bis-policy-rates-scraper"
        }
    }
}
```

The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer <APIFY_API_TOKEN>` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations).

## OpenAPI specification

Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/DCe0J7UdBOQb9c9Xj/builds/oQpyvChE48EeZdx3D/openapi.json