Bank Assets - A Sign of Growth

I track US Commercial Bank Assets about once per month.  Over the past 3 years, most banks were hoarding cash (as we all now) and buying US Treasury bonds (borrowing from the Fed at  ..75 and buying Treasuries at 2-4% was not a bad trade).  Those two assets -cash and treasuries - were about the only two assets that were increasing in size on US banks over the past 3 years.  Last summer, however, we started to see some of the traditional asset categories increase.  Here are a few examples over the past 3yrs:

Bank Credit - $9.6tln today ->More lending 
                     - $9.6tln 08/09
                     - $8.8tln 10/11

 Loans and Leases - $6.9tln today -> More lending 
                                 - $7.4tln 08/09
                                 - $6.5tln 10/11

Commercial and Industrial - $1.4tln today -> More lending 
                                           - $1.6tln 08/09
                                           - $1.2tln 10/11

Real Estate - $3.5tln today -> At least not shrinking
                    - $3.9tln 08/09
                    - $3.5tln 10/11 

Government Securities - $1.7tln today -> Still high
                                      - $1.1tln 08/09 
                                      - $1.6tln 10/11

Cash - $1.7tln today -> Still high but dropping
          - $.400tln 08/09
          - $1.9tln 10/11

Conclusion: Commercial banks clearly need to put cash to work.  They no longer have massive leverage through credit derivative instruments (CDO's etc) to drive profits.  They need to start lending and I think this is the start of it.  This expansion of US Bank Assets is the oil in the machine.  I think this is a strong positive for corporate credit.