--- title: "Total Securities: definition, formula, and thresholds" description: "Total securities is a bank's entire investment portfolio, held-to-maturity bonds at amortized cost plus available-for-sale bonds at fair value. It is typically the second-largest asset after loans and the bank's main liquidity reserve and interest-rate-risk position." canonical_url: https://www.bankregreports.com/glossary/total-securities/ source: BankRegReports category: "Securities & Investments" units: "$" schedule: "Schedule RC-B" --- # Total Securities > Total securities is a bank's entire investment portfolio, held-to-maturity bonds at amortized cost plus available-for-sale bonds at fair value. It is typically the second-largest asset after loans and the bank's main liquidity reserve and interest-rate-risk position. ## Formula ``` Total Securities = HTM Securities (amortized cost) + AFS Securities (fair value) ``` Schedule RC-B reports the portfolio by classification and instrument type. HTM bonds are carried at amortized cost and AFS bonds at fair value, so the total mixes two measurement bases, which is why the embedded unrealized losses matter when reading it. Equity securities with readily determinable fair values are reported outside Schedule RC-B (Schedule RC, item 2.c). ## Why it matters The securities book is where banks park deposits they haven't lent out, so it doubles as a liquidity buffer and a yield source. But it also concentrates interest-rate risk: a large, long-duration portfolio bought at low rates is exactly what generated the unrealized losses behind the 2023 turmoil. ## How to read it Read total securities as a share of assets and against the loan book. A bank with securities far above peers may be struggling to find loan demand or reaching for yield; the duration and the HTM/AFS split determine how much hidden rate risk the total conceals. ## Thresholds | Range | Reading | What it means | |---|---|---| | Short-duration, liquid | Strong | Portfolio is a genuine liquidity buffer with little rate risk. | | Typical | Adequate | Securities share roughly in line with peers. | | Large / long-duration | Watch | Sizable book carrying meaningful unrealized-loss risk. | | Outsized vs. capital | Concern | Embedded losses could threaten capital if liquidity forces sales. | ## Worked example A $3 billion-asset bank holding $900 million in total securities has about 30% of assets in the portfolio. If two-thirds sits in held-to-maturity bonds bought in 2021, much of any rate-driven loss is hidden at amortized cost, so the headline total understates the economic exposure. ## Questions ### Why do banks hold so many securities? Securities absorb deposits that exceed loan demand, provide liquidity that can be pledged or sold, and earn yield. They also help manage interest-rate risk, though bought at the wrong time they create it. ### Does 'total securities' include trading assets? Investment securities (HTM and AFS) are reported separately from trading assets, which are held for short-term resale and marked through income. Most community banks have no trading book. ## Sources - [FFIEC Call Report Schedule RC-B (Securities)](https://www.ffiec.gov/sites/default/files/data/reporting-forms/FFIEC031_FFIEC041_202606_i.pdf) (PDF) ## Related metrics - [Held-to-Maturity Securities](https://www.bankregreports.com/glossary/htm-securities/): Held-to-maturity (HTM) securities are bonds a bank intends and is able to hold until they mature. They are carried at amortized cost (not fair value) so unrealized price changes do not flow through earnings or capital while the bank holds them. - [Available-for-Sale Securities](https://www.bankregreports.com/glossary/afs-securities/): Available-for-sale (AFS) securities are bonds a bank may sell before maturity for liquidity or balance-sheet management. They are carried at fair value, and their unrealized gains and losses flow through accumulated other comprehensive income (AOCI) into equity. - [U.S. Treasury Securities](https://www.bankregreports.com/glossary/us-treasury-securities/): U.S. Treasury securities held by a bank are direct obligations of the federal government, the highest-quality, most-liquid assets a bank can own. They carry a 0% capital risk weight and qualify as high-quality liquid assets, but long-dated Treasuries still carry interest-rate risk. - [Mortgage-Backed Securities](https://www.bankregreports.com/glossary/mortgage-backed-securities/): Mortgage-backed securities (MBS) are bonds backed by pools of home loans. Banks hold mostly agency MBS (guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, or Ginnie Mae), which carry low credit risk but significant interest-rate and prepayment risk. - [Trading Assets](https://www.bankregreports.com/glossary/trading-assets/): Trading assets are securities and derivatives a bank holds for short-term resale or to serve client market-making, carried at fair value with changes running through earnings. They are concentrated at the largest dealer banks and are essentially absent at community banks. ## About this document This is the markdown twin of the page named in `canonical_url` above. Source filings are public record; the cleaning, normalization, cross-source linkage, and derived metrics are BankRegReports' own. Attribute with a link to the canonical URL. Markdown twins are published for editorial content only. Institution data pages do not have them. For data at scale use the API, which is documented at https://www.bankregreports.com/api/ and specified at https://www.bankregreports.com/openapi.json. It returns typed JSON with explicit units and periods, and one call replaces hundreds of page fetches. ## Sitemap - [Glossary](https://www.bankregreports.com/glossary/): every metric, with formula and thresholds - [Blog](https://www.bankregreports.com/blog/): analysis and explainers - [API documentation](https://www.bankregreports.com/api/): the programmatic way to get this data - [XML sitemap](https://www.bankregreports.com/sitemap.xml): the complete crawlable index