This week marked the first deadline for 2016 presidential candidates and their affiliated political action committees to submit their campaign finance records to the Federal Election Commission.

By requiring that outside groups, super PACs, and each candidate's campaign committee disclose their fundraising totals and expenditures, the FEC offers a closer look at the direction of the 2016 campaign.

Here's what we learned.

1. Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton are the front-runners in fundraising too.

With nearly $200 million raised between them, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are the field's biggest fundraisers.

Clinton's campaign committee raked in $47.5 million between her presidential announcement in mid-April and the end of the second fundraising quarter on June 30. According to one analysis, 60 percent of Clinton's donors were women and the majority of contributions were $250 or less.

Outside groups supporting the Democratic front-runner raised over $15 million, bringing Clinton's grand total to $63.1 million. However, Clinton's campaign committee blew through $18 million leaving her with $28 million cash on hand at the end of the quarter, according to FEC records.

At $11.4 million, Bush's campaign committee raised far less than Clinton's. But the legacy candidate's super PAC, Right to Rise, hauled in an unrivaled amount of $103 million. Unlike Clinton's network of small donors, FEC records show that a large percentage of Bush's donors contributed the maximum dollar amount of $2,700.

2. Many GOP candidates spent more than half of what they took in.

The costs of running a presidential campaign can add up quickly. Between ad buys, fundraising costs, research, and payroll, candidates are often forced to shell out millions to remain in the race and according to FEC records, a few Republican candidates did.

At least of four GOP presidential hopefuls spent more than half of the overall money they raised to stay afloat.

Former neurosurgeon Ben Carson was left with a little over $4.7 million cash on hand after his campaign spent nearly $6 million of the $10.6 million it raised.

Among the weakest fundraising hauls, was the campaign committee of former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum. The Catholic candidate raised a little over $600,000, but spent more than $375,000.

Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry raised over $1.1 million in campaign contributions, but his net overall expenditures totaled more than $580,000.

While outside groups supporting former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee raised nearly $6 million, Huckabee's campaign committee spent more than half of the $2 million it raised.

3. Bernie Sanders and Rand Paul rely heavily on grassroots support.

Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders has brought in more money than any Republican candidate when PACs and outside groups are left out of the equation.

As previously reported by the Washington Examiner, Sanders' campaign committee's $15 million haul includes over 400,000 campaign contributions of $250 or less. The 250,000 individuals who contributed to the self-declared socialist's campaign made an average donation of $33.51.

Similar to his father, former Rep. Ron Paul, Republican presidential candidate Rand Paul has relied mostly on small donors. Ninety-six percent of the donations made to the Kentucky senator's campaign–which has raised about $7 million so far — were for $100 or less.

"Those numbers prove that Paul has raw grassroots support nationwide, and hardworking people who aren't part of the permanent political class — the folks who can't max out in thousands of dollars of donations to various political candidates — are doing whatever they can to help him out," wrote Matthew Boyle, an investigative reporter at Breitbart.

4. Second-tier GOP candidates lag behind the party's favorites in fundraising too.

The three Republican candidates whose campaign committees and outside supporters brought in the most money – Bush, Cruz, and Rubio –raised a combined total of roughly $210 million.

In contrast, the combined total for the rest of the GOP field — not including New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie or Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker who didn't file their candidacies with the FEC before the June 30 deadline — was slightly less than $75 million, according to one estimate.

5. The 2016 presidential campaign could easily make fundraising history.

The grand total raised so far by 2016 candidates' campaign committees is $122.4 million – not counting the hundreds of millions of dollars raised by outside groups and super PACs. That total, based on FEC data, is around $363 million.

In comparison, Huffington Post reports that at this point in the 2012 election cycle, the major candidates' campaigns had only amassed around $83 million.

"Of course, a part of this spike is that there are far more major candidates this time around," notes HuffPo's money in politics reporter, Paul Blumenthal. "While the candidates' slices of the fundraising pie may not have grown a lot on average, the total pie this time looks to be far bigger."