Tel Aviv Stock Exchange Takes Breather After 8 Percent Drop

YERUSHALAYIM
Tel Aviv Stock Exchange
The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (Miriam Alster/Flash90, File)

The coronavirus battered the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange on Monday, as shares on TA 35 index dropped 8 percent and the TA 125 index also lost more than 7 percent.

The steep losses prompted a halt in trading for half an hour to calm markets, The Times of Israel reported.

Misery loves company, and there was plenty of both, in Tel Aviv as well as on Wall Street and Asian and European markets, following a U.S. Federal Reserve decision to cut its key rate by a full percentage point, to a range between zero and 0.25 percent, to which markets did not respond well.

Among the big losers in Israel was the Fattal hotel chain, whose shares plunged 29 percent, while oil and gas exploration firm Energean, which is developing some of Israel’s offshore natural gas fields, dropped 24 percent.

The banks had a hard day too. Bank Leumi fell 4.40 percent; Bank Hapoalim fell 5.99; and Discount Bank, was down 8.92.

However, there was some good news: Delek Group clawed back 11.84 percent of recent losses; and Opko Health rose 5.57 percent.

On the foreign exchange market, the representative shekel-dollar rate was set 2.08 percent higher, at NIS 3.7280/$, and the representative shekel-euro rate was set 2.11 percent higher, at NIS 4.1639/€.

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