Commercial banks and savings institutions held $1.521 trillion of single-family MBS in their retained portfolios as of the end of the first quarter of 2014, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS ranking and analysis of call report data. Bank and thrift MBS holdings were up a modest 1.0 percent from the previous quarter, but it marked the first increase since the third quarter of 2012, when the Federal Reserve began aggressively buying agency MBS and Treasury securities. Significantly, the increase in bank MBS holdings came at a time when new issuance was plummeting. MBS purchases...[Includes two data charts]