I have noticed from the profiles of top players that events from outside USCF jurisdictions are often rated. For example, the 2026 FIDE Candidates (FIDE Candidates Tournament 2026 | US Chess Ratings), which was held in Cyprus, affected the USCF ratings for Caruana and Nakamura. Of course, USCF ratings don’t matter for these players–there arguably aren’t any significant titles in the USCF after NM. But out of curiosity, is there a reason these FIDE events are rated by the USCF?
Yes, years ago the top players demanded that we do that, since for many of them playing in foreign FIDE rated events was the majority of their activity. (I think this also impacted activity counts, which can be a requirement for invitational events.)
At this point US Chess policy is that all players in FIDE ratings will get FIDE adjustments, but we can only adjust for games where the opponent has a published FIDE rating, FIDE does not take games against players without a published FIDE rating into account when computing ratings, either.
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Doing such ratings also alerts a player whose ID may have been incorrectly used in a FIDE event. I know a TD/arbiter that has never played a FIDE-rated game but shows as having 15 such games in FIDE, and only found out because he was listed for a foreign tournament played maybe six thousand miles from where he was. Such USChess-only players do not track their FIDE ratings and if he hadn’t received the US Chess rating report notification he many never have known about it (or the other 11 games that were incorrectly attributed to him).