The shekel has started the trading week in the foreign exchange market by weakening significantly against the euro, while maintaining its value against the US dollar.
In inter-bank trade, the shekel currently stands at NIS 4.800/$, a 0.15% appreciation from Friday’s rate of NIS 4.807/$. But against the euro, the shekel is weakening more than 1% from Friday’s rate, as the European currency strengthens against the dollar in world markets. At web-posting, the shekel is trading around NIS 4.7318/€, compared with Friday’s representative rate of NIS 4.682/€.
Analysts in the market expect the shekel to trade in the NIS 4.75-4.85/$ range in the coming weeks. Last week, the shekel depreciated 0.8% against the dollar, after strengthening almost 4% against the US currency in the preceding week.
The capital market believes last week’s weakening of the shekel was partly a response to the Governor of the Bank of Israel David Klein’s statement at the Caesarea economic conference, where he again spoke out against the Ministry of Finance and warned against the renewed threat of a financial crisis. The market fears that the confrontation between Klein and Minister of Finance Silvan Shalom may flare up again, which would again jeopardize the shekel.
Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on 8 July, 2002