The shekel is strengthening today against the dollar and stable against the euro. In afternoon inter-bank trading, the shekel was down 0.56% against the dollar at NIS 3.185/$ and up 0.02% against the euro at NIS 3.932/€.
Yesterday, the Bank of Israel set the representative shekel-dollar rate 0.094% lower from Monday, at NIS 3.203/$, and the representative shekel-euro rate was set 0.279% lower, at NIS 3.931/€.
The dollar is weakening on world markets after the Democrats look poised to gain control of the Senate, disappointing investors, who had wanted Congress to moderate Joe Biden's economic policies. Consequently, the shekel has pushed the dollar below NIS 3.20/$ for the first time since October 1996 after gaining 7% against the dollar in 2020 and strengthening 8% against the US currency in 2019. Analysts expect the shekel to continue to strengthen.
Despite the lockdown and political uncertainty and world-beating success of Israel's vaccination drive and the strength of the tech sector are likely to keep the shekel strong in 2021.
Leumi Capital Markets head of market strategy Kobi Levi says that taking into account all the potential political and Covid-19 surprises, he sees the shekel-dollar exchange rate moving in the NIS 3.12-3.32 range in 2021.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on January 6, 2021
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