WASHINGTON — Lending through the Federal Reserve Board's discount window rose 8% during the past week, to $132.7 billion.
The jump was largely due to a 34.4% boost in borrowing by traditional banks, which totaled $49.2 billion on Wednesday. Borrowing by troubled commercial banks, which rested at zero last week, rose to $20 million.
Borrowing against asset-backed commercial paper held by money market mutual funds fell 16.8%, to $15.5 billion.
Investment banks continued to abstain from the discount window from the seventh week in a row.
Separate from the discount window, the Fed purchased $124 billion in commercial paper by Wednesday, a 6.1% decline from a week earlier.
Reserves held by financial institutions at the central bank bumped up 0.2%, to $745.2 billion. The Fed's balance sheet shrank 2.3%, to $2.03 billion.
Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York purchased $23.8 billion in mortgage-backed securities from the government-sponsored enterprises over the past week: $11.4 from Fannie Mae; $8.8 billion from Freddie Mac and $3.6 billion from Ginnie Mae.
