The Fed's weekly position data released on Thursday showed that its balance sheet exceeded $8 trillion for the first time.
This means that the size of COVID-19 's balance sheet has nearly doubled since the outbreak of the COVID-19 epidemic in March last year and the Fed launched large-scale asset purchases.
The report also shows that since the Fed announced on June 4 that it would phase out its nearly $14 billion secondary market corporate credit facility, (SMCCF), the bank appears to have sold about $160 million of corporate bonds. As a first step, the Fed began selling its shares in 16 bond exchange-traded funds ((ETF)) on Monday.
SMCCF is just one of many emergency measures introduced by the Fed last spring, and while Fed support measures restored liquidity in credit markets, the tool ended up being rarely used and the sale of its holdings is not expected to have a serious impact on the market.