The Fed’s latest ‘factors affecting reserve balances’ is out and will have Fed-balance sheet watchers rather excited – an expansion to no less than a magical $2 trillion figure ($2,075,822m to be precise).
This ballooning of course is best expressed graphically:
And what’s led to that massive spike in particular this week? Predominantly, it’s the net portfolio holdings from the Fed’s ‘commercial paper funding facility’…which in the last week alone has expanded by $98bn to $243bn.
We’ll be charting that separately over the coming weeks…
Related Links:
Fed capitulates: the central bank is broken – FT Alphaville
A ‘paper-gold’ reserve system? – FT Alphaville