monarch-mcp-server

Monarch Money MCP Server

A Model Context Protocol (MCP) server for integrating with the Monarch Money personal finance platform. This server provides seamless access to your financial accounts, transactions, budgets, and analytics through Claude Desktop and Claude Code.

My MonarchMoney referral: https://www.monarchmoney.com/referral/ufmn0r83yf?r_source=share

Built with the MonarchMoneyCommunity Python library - An actively maintained community fork of the Monarch Money API with full MFA support.

🚀 Quick Start

If you plan to use this MCP server locally / on the same computer as Claude Desktop or similar, start with the Local Installation section.

For other deployment scenarios - like containerized deployment or cloud hosting - start with the Containerized Deployment section.

1. Local Installation

1. Clone this repository:

   git clone https://github.com/robcerda/monarch-mcp-server.git
   cd monarch-mcp-server
   

2. Install dependencies:

   Using uv (recommended):

   uv sync --locked
   

   --locked installs exactly what uv.lock pins, verified against the hashes it records, and refuses to re-resolve. Without it, uv sync is free to pick up whatever versions happen to satisfy the ranges today.

   Using pip:

   pip install -r requirements-lock.txt --require-hashes
   pip install -e . --no-deps
   

   requirements-lock.txt is generated from uv.lock and pins every transitive dependency with hashes, so --require-hashes gives the pip path the same guarantee as the uv one. --no-deps on the second command stops pip re-resolving what the first command just pinned.

   pip install -r requirements.txt still works and installs exactly the same set. That file is now a one line include of requirements-lock.txt, kept so existing setups and scripts do not break. The pins moved out of it because a root requirements.txt gets resolved as an independent manifest, which had started producing a pinned set that disagreed with uv.lock.

3. Configure Claude Desktop: Add this to your Claude Desktop configuration file:

   macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

   Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

   {
     "mcpServers": {
       "Monarch Money": {
         "command": "/opt/homebrew/bin/uv",
         "args": [
           "run",
           "--locked",
           "--project",
           "/path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server",
           "monarch-mcp-server"
         ]
       }
     }
   }
   

   Important: Replace /path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server with your actual path!

   uv run --locked --project resolves dependencies from the repo's uv.lock, and monarch-mcp-server is the console script declared in pyproject.toml. --locked matters: without it, a lockfile that has drifted from pyproject.toml is silently re-resolved against PyPI and the recorded hashes stop being enforced. With it, drift is a startup error. Earlier versions of this README used uv run --with 'mcp[cli]', which builds a fresh unpinned environment on every launch and silently picks up whatever the newest release happens to be. That is what broke every install when the MCP SDK published 2.0, and the client only reported it as the server disconnecting. Pinning the launch to the lockfile means a new upstream release cannot change what your server runs.

4. Restart Claude Desktop

OR

3. Configure Claude Code (CLI): Add this to your Claude Code configuration file:

   Global (all projects):

   macOS/Linux: ~/.claude.json

   Windows: %USERPROFILE%\.claude.json

   {
     "mcpServers": {
       "Monarch Money": {
         "command": "/opt/homebrew/bin/uv",
         "args": [
           "run",
           "--locked",
           "--project",
           "/path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server",
           "monarch-mcp-server"
         ]
       }
     }
   }
   

   Project-level (specific directory):

   Create .mcp.json in your project directory:

   {
     "Monarch Money": {
       "command": "/opt/homebrew/bin/uv",
       "args": [
         "run",
         "--locked",
         "--project",
         "/path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server",
         "monarch-mcp-server"
       ]
     }
   }
   

   If installed via pip instead of uv, use:

   {
     "command": "python",
     "args": ["/path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server/src/monarch_mcp_server/server.py"]
   }
   

   Important: Replace /path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server with your actual path!

4. Restart Claude Code

2. One-Time Authentication Setup

Important: For security and MFA support, authentication is done outside of Claude.

Open a terminal and run:

cd /path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server
uv run python login_setup.py        # or: python login_setup.py

The script offers three login paths:

Option 1 (recommended): Session cookies from your browser

Long-lived sessions, supports SSO accounts, and sidesteps Cloudflare CAPTCHA gates on programmatic login. Steps:

1. Log in to https://app.monarch.com in Chrome or Firefox.

2. Open DevTools (F12) → Network tab.

3. Click any request whose Name starts with graphql (or any request to api.monarch.com).

4. Scroll to Request Headers, find the cookie: header, and copy the full value.

5. Save it to the cookie file for your platform (recommended), then re-run the script — it reads the file automatically:

   macOS / Linux — ~/.config/monarch-mcp/cookie.txt (respects $XDG_CONFIG_HOME):

   mkdir -p ~/.config/monarch-mcp
   # paste the cookie value into the file with your editor, then:
   chmod 600 ~/.config/monarch-mcp/cookie.txt
   

   Windows — %APPDATA%\monarch-mcp\cookie.txt:

   New-Item -ItemType Directory -Force "$env:APPDATA\monarch-mcp" | Out-Null
   notepad "$env:APPDATA\monarch-mcp\cookie.txt"   # paste the cookie value, save, close
   

   Files under your user profile are already ACL-restricted to your account on Windows; no chmod equivalent is needed for typical single-user machines.

   To use a different location on any platform, set the MONARCH_MCP_COOKIE_FILE environment variable to the full path.

   Alternatively, paste the value at the interactive prompt — but note that POSIX terminals silently truncate pasted input at the canonical-mode buffer limit (MAX_CANON, 1024 bytes on macOS/Linux), and real Monarch cookie headers are usually longer than that, so the prompt path fails with a confusing auth error for most users. The cookie file has no length limit and survives repo updates.

The script verifies the cookies against the live API before saving them to your system keyring. The cookie file is only read at setup time; the running MCP server uses the keyring session.

Option 2: Email and password

Standard interactive login. The script handles:

• Email verification codes (Monarch may send one for a new device session even when MFA is off).
• TOTP MFA codes if you have MFA enabled.
• Cloudflare CAPTCHA detection: if Monarch blocks programmatic login, the script tells you to switch to option 1.

The resulting long-lived session token is saved to your system keyring.

Option 3: Legacy session token paste

Kept for users with an existing token captured before the May 2026 API change. Monarch may no longer accept token-only auth on the GraphQL endpoint; if the verification call returns 401, fall back to option 1.

3. Start Using

Once authenticated, use these tools directly in Claude Desktop or Claude Code:

• get_accounts - View all your financial accounts
• get_transactions - Recent transactions with filtering
• get_budgets - Budget information and spending
• get_cashflow - Income/expense analysis

Containerized Deployment

The Docker image uses Astral's uv/Python 3.12 slim base, installs from uv.lock, and defaults to HTTP on 0.0.0.0:8000 inside the container.

Build the image

docker build -t monarch-mcp-server .

Authenticate

Authenticate once using a persistent session volume:

docker run --rm -it \
  -v monarch-session:/home/app/.monarch-mcp-server \
  monarch-mcp-server python login_setup.py

The login script supports a cookie file for browser-cookie authentication. To use it, also mount your cookie file at /tmp/monarch-cookie.txt:ro and set MONARCH_MCP_COOKIE_FILE=/tmp/monarch-cookie.txt for the login container.

The file must be readable by the container's uid 10001, which conflicts with the chmod 600 advised for the local flow: a 0600 file owned by your host user is not readable by uid 10001 inside the container. For the container login, either chown 10001 cookie.txt and keep it at 0600, or run the login container with --user $(id -u) so it reads the file as you. Do not widen it to 0644. Delete the file once the login has succeeded.

Once saved, the session volume is sufficient for normal server launches.

Important

The session is stored unencrypted in that volume. This differs from a local install, and the difference is easy to miss.

On macOS and Windows the session goes to the system keyring. A container has no keyring backend, so storage falls back to a file. That file is encrypted at rest only on Windows, through DPAPI, so in a Linux container it holds your Monarch session in plaintext. Permissions are as tight as a file can be, mode 0600 inside a 0700 directory owned by uid 10001, but file permissions do not help against anyone who can reach the volume from outside the container.

Treat monarch-session as a secret. It can be read by root on the Docker host, by any user in the docker group, by any other container that mounts the same volume, by docker cp and docker exec, and by anything that backs up /var/lib/docker. A Monarch session grants full read and write access to your accounts and does not expire on its own, so a copy of this volume is a lasting credential. Back it up only to somewhere you would keep a password, and delete the volume with docker volume rm monarch-session when you are done with it.

The cookie file described below is the same kind of secret. Delete it once the login has succeeded; it is only needed for that one run.

Start the HTTP server

Reuse the session volume when starting the server:

$ docker run -d --name monarch-mcp --restart unless-stopped \
  -p 127.0.0.1:8000:8000 \
  -v monarch-session:/home/app/.monarch-mcp-server \
  monarch-mcp-server

Connect your MCP client to http://127.0.0.1:8000/mcp using Streamable HTTP. See HTTP transport configuration for all settings.

The image runs in read only mode by default, because the HTTP transport does not authenticate callers. Anything that can reach the port would otherwise be able to call monarch_logout, or monarch_login_with_token to swap your saved session for another Monarch account. Login happens in the separate login_setup.py container above, so the running server never needs those tools.

To allow writes, add -e MONARCH_MCP_READ_ONLY=0. That registers every mutating tool, including the login and logout tools, on the listening socket, so only do it where every client that can reach the port is trusted.

Connect from another machine

Warning

This MCP server is not multi-user or multi-account. All connected clients share the same session and permissions. Ensure that you understand the security implications before exposing the server to a network.

To connect from another machine, put the container behind an authenticated HTTPS reverse proxy or a private network with access controls, publish the port on the appropriate interface, and allow the hostname used by the client:

docker run -d --name monarch-mcp --restart unless-stopped \
  -p 127.0.0.1:8000:8000 \
  -e MONARCH_MCP_ALLOWED_HOSTS=mcp.example.com \
  -v monarch-session:/home/app/.monarch-mcp-server \
  monarch-mcp-server

Here a reverse proxy on the Docker host forwards https://mcp.example.com/mcp to http://127.0.0.1:8000/mcp, preserving the public Host header.

The proxy must support streaming responses without buffering. For direct access on a private network, allow the client's Host value including the port, such as server.lan:8000.

Let me stress this point: This is a single-account server! All connected clients share the same saved Monarch session and permissions, including enabled write tools. Basic Host/origin checks protect against DNS rebinding; they do not authenticate callers. Use one server and session volume per Monarch account if you need to.

Use STDIO instead

To run the Docker image over STDIO instead:

docker run --rm -i \
  -e MONARCH_MCP_TRANSPORT=stdio \
  -v monarch-session:/home/app/.monarch-mcp-server \
  monarch-mcp-server

HTTP Transport Configuration

The server supports MCP Streamable HTTP at /mcp but only when explicitly selected:

uv run --locked monarch-mcp-server --transport http --host 127.0.0.1 --port 8000

Connect an MCP client using Streamable HTTP to http://127.0.0.1:8000/mcp.

Setting	CLI flag	Environment variable	Default outside Docker
Transport	--transport	MONARCH_MCP_TRANSPORT	stdio (http aliases streamable-http)
Listen address	--host	MONARCH_MCP_HOST	127.0.0.1
Listen port	--port	MONARCH_MCP_PORT	8000
Additional allowed Host headers	--allowed-host (repeatable)	MONARCH_MCP_ALLOWED_HOSTS (comma-separated)	None; loopback hosts are always allowed
Additional allowed browser Origins	--allowed-origin (repeatable)	MONARCH_MCP_ALLOWED_ORIGINS (comma-separated)	None; HTTP loopback origins are always allowed

CLI flags override their environment settings. Host entries include the port when clients send one; server.lan:* allows any port. Origin entries include the scheme, for example https://client.example.com. Clients without an Origin header are supported. Browser clients may additionally require CORS handling at the reverse proxy.

Meta Muse

Works great with Meta Muse, Meta's AI assistant, alongside Claude Desktop and Claude Code. Muse speaks MCP, so it connects the same way as any other client: give it the stdio launch command from the installation section, or point it at the Streamable HTTP endpoint if you are running the container.

Using Muse? Ask it to install this server from this repo. Muse can handle the install and register the server with itself, but authentication is a step only you can do: run login_setup.py once and paste a browser cookie, or enter your password and MFA. After that, ask Muse to list your Monarch accounts to confirm it is working.

Check out Muse, your personal AI agent. Redeem my code in Settings within 48 hours of joining and we'll both get 1 billion Muse tokens.

Code: O63W0U

https://muse.ai/join

✨ Features

📊 Account Management

• Get Accounts: View all linked financial accounts with balances and institution info
• Get Account Holdings: See securities and investments in investment accounts
• Refresh Accounts: Request real-time data updates from financial institutions

💰 Transaction Access

• Get Transactions: Fetch transaction data with filtering by date, account, and pagination
• Create Transaction: Add new transactions to accounts
• Update Transaction: Modify existing transactions (amount, description, category, date)

🏷️ Category Management

• Get Categories: List all transaction categories with groups, icons, and metadata
• Get Category Groups: View category groups with their associated categories

📋 Transaction Review

• Get Transactions Needing Review: Find transactions that need attention (uncategorized, no notes, flagged)
• Set Transaction Category: Assign a category to a transaction
• Update Transaction Notes: Add or update notes on transactions (great for receipt links)
• Mark Transaction Reviewed: Clear the needs_review flag on transactions

📦 Bulk Operations

• Bulk Categorize Transactions: Apply a category to multiple transactions at once

🔖 Tag Management

• Get Tags: List all available tags with colors and usage counts
• Set Transaction Tags: Apply tags to a transaction
• Create Tag: Create a new tag with custom name and color

🔍 Advanced Search

• Search Transactions: Comprehensive search with filters for merchant, category, account, tags, date ranges, and amounts
• Get Transaction Details: Retrieve complete details for a single transaction
• Delete Transaction: Remove a transaction
• Get Recurring Transactions: View upcoming recurring transactions

🤖 Transaction Rules (Auto-Categorization)

• Get Transaction Rules: List all auto-categorization rules
• Create Transaction Rule: Create rules with merchant/amount conditions to auto-categorize
• Update Transaction Rule: Modify existing rules
• Delete Transaction Rule: Remove a rule

Recurring forecasts and synced bills

get_recurring_transactions() includes merchant forecasts and synced liability bills (such as credit cards and loans). Set include_liabilities=False to request only merchant recurring items. Omit both dates for the current calendar month, or provide both start_date and end_date in YYYY-MM-DD format.

The default response remains a JSON list with the existing merchant fields. Each item also exposes account_id, category_id, amount_diff, and the stream's name and merchant_id. A liability item can have a null merchant. Its stream.credit_report_liability_account contains the liability id, linked account_id/account name, and last_statement with id, due_date, bill_amount, minimum_payment_amount, payment_status, and remaining_balance. Missing statements and unknown balances stay null; paid balances stay zero.

These are not interchangeable amounts. The item's amount and stream's amount are recurring forecasts. last_statement.bill_amount is the original synced statement amount; remaining_balance is the remaining synced statement balance. The latest statement's due date can differ from the forecast item's date. Payment status is returned as supplied by Monarch, not inferred. These values reflect the latest sync, not a guaranteed real-time amount owed.

Merchant forecasts and liability bills can describe the same payment. The tool preserves both with their identities: it does not sum, deduplicate, or substitute forecast amounts for unknown statement balances.

With limit omitted, the tool reads every page itself and returns the complete range, so the default list is the whole month. Pass limit to read a single page instead, and use include_metadata=True to opt into the standard envelope (data, args, count, total_count, truncated, tool, search):

get_recurring_transactions(
    start_date="2026-02-01", end_date="2026-02-28",
    include_liabilities=True, limit=100, offset=0, include_metadata=True,
)

The API supplies no total, so total_count is null. With an explicit limit, a full page is conservatively marked truncated=True (more rows may exist). Keep the dates and filters fixed, advance offset by count, and continue until truncated=False. An exactly full final page requires one more request, which may return an empty page.

Synced bills require bill sync to be available and configured in Monarch; the tool does not enable it or refresh institutions.

🔄 Merchant & Recurring Stream Management

• Get Merchant: View a merchant's details including recurring transaction stream configuration
• Update Merchant: Modify a merchant's name and/or recurring stream settings (frequency, amount, base date)
• Review Recurring Stream: Accept, ignore, or reset recurring transaction streams detected by Monarch

✂️ Transaction Splits

• Get Transaction Splits: View how a transaction has been split into parts
• Split Transaction: Divide a single transaction into multiple parts with different categories or merchants

💵 Budget Management

• Get Budgets: Access budget information including spent amounts and remaining balances by category
• Set Budget Amount: Create or modify budget amounts for any category or category group

📈 Net Worth Tracking

• Get Net Worth: Track total net worth over time with daily snapshots and trend analysis
• Get Account Balance History: View historical balance data for any account
• Get Net Worth by Account Type: See net worth breakdown across account types (checking, savings, investments, etc.)

📊 Financial Analysis

• Get Cashflow: Analyze financial cashflow over specified date ranges with income/expense breakdowns
• Get Transactions Summary: Quick high-level statistics about your transactions
• Get Spending Summary: Spending breakdown by category with totals

🔐 Secure Authentication

• One-Time Setup: Authenticate once, use for weeks/months
• Email OTP Support: Handles Monarch's email verification flow for new devices/sessions
• MFA Support: Full support for two-factor authentication
• SSO/Google sign-in: Use monarch_login_with_token to paste a session token from your browser
• Session Persistence: No need to re-authenticate frequently
• Secure: Credentials never pass through Claude

🛠️ Available Tools

All 60 registered tools. Required parameters are listed first, optional ones are marked with a trailing question mark. This table is generated from the live tool registry and the functions' signatures, so it does not drift.

Tool	Description	Parameters
add_transaction_tag	Add a tag to a transaction, preserving any tags already on it	transaction_id, tag_id
bulk_categorize_transactions	Apply the same category to multiple transactions at once	transaction_ids, category_id, mark_reviewed?, dry_run?
bulk_update_transactions	Apply the same edit to many transactions in one request	transaction_ids, category_id?, merchant_name?, notes?, goal_id?, needs_review?, business_entity_id?, dry_run?
categorize_transaction	Assign a category to a transaction	transaction_id, category_id
check_auth_status	Report the stored session and its auth mode	None
create_transaction	Create a new transaction in Monarch Money	date, account_id, amount, merchant_name, category_id, notes?, update_balance?
create_transaction_category	Create a new transaction category	group_id, transaction_category_name, icon?, rollover_enabled?, rollover_type?
create_transaction_rule	Create a new transaction auto-categorization rule	merchant_criteria_operator?, merchant_criteria_value?, merchant_criteria_values?, merchant_criteria?, original_statement_operator?, original_statement_values?, original_statement_criteria?, use_original_statement?, amount_operator?, amount_value?, amount_lower?, amount_upper?, amount_is_expense?, set_category_id?, set_merchant_name?, add_tag_ids?, link_goal_id?, hide_from_reports?, review_status?, account_ids?, category_ids?, apply_to_existing?
create_transaction_tag	Create a new transaction tag	name, color
debug_session_loading	Diagnose session loading problems	None
delete_transaction	Delete a transaction from Monarch Money	transaction_id
delete_transaction_rule	Delete a transaction rule	rule_id
get_account_balance_history	Get historical balance data for a specific account	account_id
get_account_holdings	Get investment holdings for a specific account	account_id
get_account_sync_health	Report the health of each linked institution connection	stale_after_days?
get_accounts	Get all financial accounts from Monarch Money	None
get_budgets	Get budget information from Monarch Money	start_date?, end_date?
get_business_entities	List the business entities on the Monarch account (id and name)	None
get_cashflow	Get cashflow analysis from Monarch Money	start_date?, end_date?
get_cashflow_by_month	Get spending trends over time, broken down by category and month	start_date, end_date
get_category_details	Get a single category's details including budget amounts for a month	category_id, month?
get_debt_paydown	Get the debt paydown plan and the accounts feeding it	method?
get_goal_contributions	Show a goal's budgeted contributions, broken down by funding account	goal_id, month?
get_goals	List Monarch savings and debt-paydown goals	None
get_merchant	Get a merchant's details including recurring transaction stream configuration	merchant_id
get_net_worth	Get net worth history over time	start_date?, end_date?, account_type?
get_net_worth_by_account_type	Get net worth breakdown by account type over time	start_date, timeframe?
get_recurring_transactions	Get upcoming recurring transactions	start_date?, end_date?, include_liabilities?, limit?, offset?, include_metadata?
get_spending_summary	Get a spending summary broken down by category, category group, and merchant	start_date?, end_date?
get_transaction_categories	Get all available transaction categories from Monarch Money	None
get_transaction_category_groups	Get all transaction category groups (parent groupings for categories)	None
get_transaction_details	Get full details for a specific transaction	transaction_id
get_transaction_rules	Get all transaction auto-categorization rules from Monarch Money	None
get_transaction_splits	Get the splits for a transaction	transaction_id
get_transaction_tags	Get all available transaction tags from Monarch Money	None
get_transactions	Get transactions from Monarch Money	limit?, offset?, start_date?, end_date?, account_id?, search?, category_ids?, category_group_ids?, account_ids?, tag_ids?, has_notes?, is_split?, is_recurring?, wide_search?, search_scan_limit?
get_transactions_needing_review	Get transactions that need review based on various criteria	needs_review?, days?, uncategorized_only?, without_notes_only?, limit?, offset?, account_id?
get_transactions_summary	Get a high-level summary of transactions	None
mark_transaction_reviewed	Mark a transaction as reviewed (clears the needs_review flag)	transaction_id
monarch_login	Sign in via a secure form in the client UI	None
monarch_login_with_token	Sign in with a browser copied session token	None
monarch_logout	Clear the stored session and drop the cached client	None
monarch_whoami	Report who is signed in and what the account's plan entitles it to	None
refresh_accounts	Request account data refresh from financial institutions	account_ids?
reorder_transaction_rule	Move a transaction rule to a new position in the evaluation order	rule_id, new_order
review_recurring_stream	Set the review status of a recurring transaction stream	stream_id, review_status
search_transactions	Search and filter transactions with comprehensive filtering options	search?, limit?, offset?, start_date?, end_date?, category_ids?, account_ids?, tag_ids?, has_attachments?, has_notes?, hidden_from_reports?, is_split?, is_recurring?
set_budget_amount	Set or update a budget amount for a category or category group	amount, category_id?, category_group_id?, start_date?, apply_to_future?
set_business_entity	Set (or clear) the business entity on one transaction	transaction_id, business_entity_id
set_goal_contribution	Set the budgeted monthly contribution to a goal from one funding account	goal_id, account_id, amount
set_transaction_tags	Set tags on a transaction	transaction_id, tag_ids
setup_authentication	Get setup instructions	None
split_transaction	Split a transaction into multiple parts with different categories/merchants	transaction_id, splits
update_account	Update an account's name, balance, type or visibility settings	account_id, name?, balance?, account_type?, account_sub_type?, include_in_net_worth?, hide_from_summary_list?, hide_transactions_from_reports?, dry_run?
update_category	Update an existing category's settings	category_id, name?, icon?, group_id?, category_type?, exclude_from_budget?, budget_variability?, rollover_enabled?, rollover_start_month?, rollover_starting_balance?, rollover_frequency?, rollover_target_amount?, rollover_type?, confirm_rollover_reset?, dry_run?
update_merchant	Update a merchant's name and/or recurring transaction stream settings	merchant_id, name?, is_recurring?, frequency?, base_date?, amount?, is_active?
update_savings_goal	Update a savings goal's target or monthly contribution	goal_id, target_amount?, target_date?, name?, priority?, goal_type?, is_sinking_fund?
update_transaction	Update an existing transaction in Monarch Money	transaction_id, category_id?, merchant_name?, goal_id?, amount?, date?, hide_from_reports?, needs_review?, notes?
update_transaction_notes	Update the notes/memo for a transaction	transaction_id, notes, receipt_url?
update_transaction_rule	Update an existing transaction rule	rule_id, merchant_criteria_operator?, merchant_criteria_value?, merchant_criteria_values?, merchant_criteria?, original_statement_operator?, original_statement_values?, original_statement_criteria?, use_original_statement?, amount_operator?, amount_value?, amount_lower?, amount_upper?, amount_is_expense?, set_category_id?, set_merchant_name?, add_tag_ids?, link_goal_id?, hide_from_reports?, review_status?, account_ids?, category_ids?, clear_category?, clear_merchant?, clear_tags?, clear_goal_link?, clear_review_status?, apply_to_existing?
upload_account_balance_history	Upload corrected balance snapshots for an account	account_id, corrections, dry_run?

📝 Usage Examples

View Your Accounts

Use get_accounts to show me all my financial accounts

Get Recent Transactions

Show me my last 50 transactions using get_transactions with limit 50

get_transactions returns a JSON object with tool, args, count, total_count, truncated, search, and data so large agent-tools/<uuid>.txt responses are self-describing. Transaction rows live in data and include original_statement / plaid_description when Monarch provides the underlying Plaid statement text, plus currency, direction, direction_source, transaction_type, category_group, and category_group_id when those values can be derived from Monarch response data. When Monarch's server-side search errors or returns no rows, wide_search scans recent transactions locally across merchant, original statement, description, notes, category, account, and tags.

Check Spending vs Budget

Use get_budgets to show my current budget status

Set a Budget Amount

Set my grocery budget to $600 for this month using set_budget_amount

Apply Budget to All Future Months

Set my entertainment budget to $150 and apply it to all future months using set_budget_amount with apply_to_future=true

Track Net Worth Over Time

Show my net worth trend for the past year using get_net_worth

View Account Balance History

Show me how my savings account balance has changed over time using get_account_balance_history

Net Worth Breakdown by Account Type

Show my net worth breakdown by account type using get_net_worth_by_account_type

Analyze Cash Flow

Get my cashflow for the last 3 months using get_cashflow

List Available Categories

Show me all available categories using get_transaction_categories

Review Uncategorized Transactions

Show me transactions from the last 7 days that need review using get_transactions_needing_review

Bulk Categorize Transactions

Categorize these three transactions as "Groceries" using bulk_categorize_transactions

Tag a Transaction

Add the "Tax Deductible" tag to this transaction using set_transaction_tags

Search for Transactions

Find all Amazon transactions from the last month using search_transactions

View Recurring Bills

Show me my upcoming recurring transactions using get_recurring_transactions

Create Auto-Categorization Rule

Create a rule to automatically categorize Amazon transactions as "Shopping" using create_transaction_rule

Split a Transaction

Split this $100 Costco transaction into $60 for Groceries and $40 for Household using split_transaction

Get Transaction Statistics

Give me a quick summary of my transactions using get_transactions_summary

View Spending by Category

Show my spending breakdown by category for last month using get_spending_summary

Update a Recurring Bill Amount

Update PennyMac's recurring stream to $1,460.93 monthly using update_merchant

Review Recurring Streams

Approve the Netflix recurring stream using review_recurring_stream

📅 Date Formats

• All dates should be in YYYY-MM-DD format (e.g., "2024-01-15")
• Transaction amounts: positive for income, negative for expenses

🔧 Troubleshooting

Authentication Issues

If you see "Authentication needed" errors:

1. Run the setup command: cd /path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server && python login_setup.py (or uv run python login_setup.py)
2. Restart Claude Desktop or Claude Code
3. Try using a tool like get_accounts

Email Verification Required

Monarch may require an email one-time code for a new device or session, even if MFA is not enabled. If you see an email-code prompt:

1. Check the email address on your Monarch account
2. Enter the one-time code in login_setup.py
3. Let the script finish so it can save the reusable token to your system keyring

Session Expired or 401 within an hour

If your session dies quickly (under a couple of hours), the most common cause is that Monarch returned a short-lived token. The login script now requests trusted_device=True and rejects any short-lived token, so a fresh login produces a long-lived session. If you re-run login_setup.py and the issue persists, switch to option 1 (browser cookies); cookie sessions track the lifetime of the underlying browser login.

Cloudflare CAPTCHA on login

If login_setup.py reports "Programmatic login is blocked by Cloudflare CAPTCHA", choose option 1 (browser cookies) instead. Email/password POSTs to Monarch's login endpoint are sometimes gated by Cloudflare for unfamiliar IPs or rapid retries; cookie-based auth bypasses that endpoint entirely.

'Context' object has no attribute 'elicit'

The monarch_login and monarch_login_with_token tools require the MCP Python SDK 1.10.0 or newer (released June 2025). If your environment cached an older mcp install, refresh it:

uv cache clean mcp

Then fully quit and reopen Claude Desktop or Claude Code so it relaunches the server with a fresh resolution. As a fallback while you upgrade, run python login_setup.py from the repo to authenticate via the terminal.

Common Error Messages

• "No valid session found": Run python login_setup.py (or uv run python login_setup.py)
• "Monarch sent a one-time code to your email": Run python login_setup.py and complete email verification
• "Invalid account ID": Use get_accounts to see valid account IDs
• "Date format error": Use YYYY-MM-DD format for dates

🏗️ Technical Details

Project Structure

monarch-mcp-server/
├── src/monarch_mcp_server/
│   ├── __init__.py
│   ├── app.py             # FastMCP app instance and entry point
│   ├── client.py          # Cached MonarchMoney client factory
│   ├── monarch_auth.py    # Current Monarch auth compatibility (host, email OTP, device-uuid)
│   ├── secure_session.py  # Keyring-backed token storage (file fallback)
│   ├── server.py          # Backward-compatibility shim re-exporting the tools
│   └── tools/             # MCP tools grouped by domain (accounts, transactions, budgets, …)
├── login_setup.py         # Terminal authentication script
├── pyproject.toml         # Project configuration
├── requirements-lock.txt  # Generated from uv.lock, hash pinned
└── README.md             # This documentation

Session Management

• Session tokens are stored securely in the system keyring (with an automatic file fallback for environments without a keyring backend)
• The device-uuid captured at login is stored alongside the token so it reloads cleanly
• Sessions persist across Claude Desktop and Claude Code restarts
• No need for frequent re-authentication

Security Features

• Credentials never transmitted through Claude Desktop or Claude Code
• MFA/2FA fully supported
• Email verification codes are handled only in the terminal setup script
• Session tokens are stored in the system keyring
• Authentication handled in secure terminal environment

Strongest option: read only mode

Set MONARCH_MCP_READ_ONLY=1 in the server's environment and the mutating tools are never registered. They do not appear in the tool list and cannot be called at all, which is stronger than an approval prompt: a model that was talked into a write by a merchant name or memo it read back cannot invoke a tool that is not there.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "Monarch Money": {
      "command": "/opt/homebrew/bin/uv",
      "args": ["run", "--project", "/path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server", "monarch-mcp-server"],
      "env": { "MONARCH_MCP_READ_ONLY": "1" }
    }
  }
}

This leaves 30 of the 58 tools available, covering everything that reads. Read only is off by default outside Docker, so existing setups are unaffected; the Docker image turns it on (see Start the HTTP server). Note that it also removes the login and logout tools, since those change durable state, so authenticate with login_setup.py before enabling it.

Recommended: require approval for mutating tools

These tools mutate your Monarch data. The list is every registered tool that writes, checked against the source rather than maintained by hand:

Accounts: update_account

Transactions: create_transaction, update_transaction, delete_transaction, categorize_transaction, update_transaction_notes, mark_transaction_reviewed, bulk_categorize_transactions, bulk_update_transactions, split_transaction, set_business_entity, upload_account_balance_history

Tags: set_transaction_tags, add_transaction_tag, create_transaction_tag

Rules: create_transaction_rule, update_transaction_rule, delete_transaction_rule, reorder_transaction_rule

Categories and budgets: create_transaction_category, update_category, set_budget_amount

Goals: update_savings_goal, set_goal_contribution

Merchants: update_merchant, review_recurring_stream

Session: monarch_login, monarch_login_with_token, monarch_logout

refresh_accounts is side effecting too, since it posts a refresh request to your institutions, though it does not change your ledger.

Because the LLM can be influenced by data it reads back (a malicious-looking memo or merchant name in a transaction), the safest setup is to configure your MCP client to require manual approval before any mutating tool runs. In Claude Desktop and Claude Code this is the default behavior for unknown tools; keep it that way for the tools listed above rather than allow-listing them.

bulk_categorize_transactions, bulk_update_transactions, upload_account_balance_history, update_account and update_category accept a dry_run=True argument that returns the planned changes without executing them, useful for previewing before approving.

update_category additionally requires confirm_rollover_reset=True before rollover_start_month or rollover_starting_balance will be applied. Those two restart a category's rollover period and discard the balance accumulated in it, which cannot be undone, so they cannot ride along unnoticed in a call that otherwise reads like a rename.

🙏 Acknowledgments

This MCP server is built on top of the MonarchMoneyCommunity Python library, an actively maintained community fork of the original MonarchMoney library by @hammem. The community fork provides:

• Updated API endpoints for Monarch Money's current domain
• Secure authentication with MFA support
• Comprehensive API coverage for Monarch Money
• Session management and persistence

Thank you to @hammem for creating and maintaining this essential library!

📄 License

MIT License

🆘 Support

For issues:

1. Check authentication with check_auth_status
2. Run the setup command again: cd /path/to/your/monarch-mcp-server && python login_setup.py
3. Check error logs for detailed messages
4. Ensure Monarch Money service is accessible

🔄 Updates

To update the server:

1. Pull latest changes from repository
2. Restart Claude Desktop or Claude Code
3. Re-run authentication if needed: python login_setup.py