Lending Through Fed Flat

WASHINGTON — Lending through the Federal Reserve Board's discount window edged up less than 1% during the past week, to $113.3 billion on Wednesday.

Traditional borrowing by commercial banks was up 0.6%, to $34.7 billion, and there were no loans to weak financial institutions.

Borrowing against asset-backed commercial paper held by money market mutual funds continued to plummet, falling 42.8% to $5.5 billion. Investment banks continued to abstain from the discount window.

Separately, the Fed purchased $111.1 billion in commercial paper in the week ending Wednesday, a 1.6% decline from the previous week.

Reserves held by financial institutions at the central bank grew nearly 8%, to $808.8 billion. The Fed's balance sheet grew 4%, to $2.07 trillion.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York purchased nearly $23 billion in mortgage-backed securities from the government-sponsored enterprises over the past week: $11.5 billion from Fannie Mae; $6.9 billion from Freddie Mac and $4.7 billion from Ginnie Mae.

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