The Bank of Israel has already implemented 24% of its plan to buy government bonds, estimates Mizrahi Tefahot Bank (TASE:MZTF) chief strategist Modi Shafrir. On March 23, the Bank of Israel announced that it would buy NIS 50 billion worth of government bonds in an attempt to moderate the sharp falls in their prices due to a lack of liquidity on the market. RELATED ARTICLES Israel's budget deficit widens to 4% Last week the Bank of Israel reported that its bond purchases in March amounted to NIS 8.5 billion. In his weekly survey today, Shafrir estimates that the Bank of Israel's bond purchases have already reached NIS 12 billion - about 24% of the overall planned purchases. He wrote, "That's before the Ministry of Finance has increased the amount of the bonds issued on the domestic market." In addition to the dollar purchases, the Bank of Israel reported that it carried out $7.5 billion worth of swap transactions in the last week of March to ease the 'dollar crunch' whereby Israeli investors needed foreign currency urgently to cover their positions in falling overseas derivatives. Published by Globes, Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on April 12, 2020 © Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2020
