The shekel strengthening in inter-bank trading today against the dollar and the euro after the Bank of Israel Monetary Committee decided to keep the interest rate for December unchanged at 0.1%
The shekel-dollar rate was down 0.4% at NIS 3.877 to the U.S. dollar compared with yesterday's representative rate, and the shekel-euro rate wa s down 0.3% at NIS 4.125 to the euro .
T he Bank of Israel set the shekel-dollar representative rate up 0.4% from Friday's rate at NIS 3.894 to the U.S. dollar , and the representative shekel-euro rate down 0.15 % at NIS 4.138 to the euro .
The FXCM Israel research department said in its market review, "The shekel-dollar exchange rate is struggling to move upwards even though the dollar is reaching new peaks worldwide. The shekel-dollar exchange rate is treading water in the NIS 3.87-3.88/$ band and yesterday again failed to break above the NIS 3.90/$ threshold, even though globally the dollar index is at an 8-month record.
" This has been caused by U . S . Fed deputy chairman Stanley Fischer's hints that the December interest rate will be raised. If the dollar does continue rising on world markets, then speculators on the Israeli market will feel more secure and the push upwards toward the NIS 3.90/$ technical barrier will resume."
