What a week it was! TA25 is currently at a level of 952 points. For those who have short memories let me recap the recent events briefly. It all started when the chairman of the Bank of Israel, Stanley Fisher, threatened to resign over salary negotiation failure for his staff at the bank. Not only that, there was speculation that the stock market would remain closed in the beginning of next week. The decline came shortly. To top that, came the recent world decline led by the US markets over mortgage crisis which did not help stop the decline.
It is always interesting to see how correlated world markets are. Especially the US and the Israeli market. I remember at an economy class I had, the Professor showed us a graph of the correlation between the US market and the Israeli market. Needles to say it was a very compelling graph. The reason he showed us the graph was his thesis to what really caused the Israeli economy bounce back up from the 2003 depression. At that point the US market also bounced back up and he thought that that was the only reason and not the economic policy. If you ask me, I’d say it is probably combination of the two.
Here are the two graphs of the TA25 and the S&P500 compared from the last 200 trading days to give you a taste
You can clearly see how correlated the two indexes are.
As always there is no shortage of financial commentary that doesn’t make any sense from the financial analysts, or as I call them in my blog, the fortune tellers. The economists over at Bank Hapoalim, argue that there is uncertainty in the market right now BUT, the market is an attractive investment. I am not sure what to make at such commentary but I know that you don’t need to be an economist to know that.
Bank Leumi doesn’t fall short with a “stellar” review, saying that in the short run there will be a lot of volatility. I’m not sure what to make of this vague review. But like I said, even them have to make a living. I can quote some more incoherent, say-nothing, predict-the-future reviews but I think you get the point.
It’ll be interesting to see how the Israeli market continues to develop next week. I don’t think the negotiation issues are far from over and this could hurt the market performance. Moreover, as always, it’s good to stay tuned to the US market as the correlation is a BIG factor in the performance of the Israeli market.
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I think there is a better correlation with Nasdaq.
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