To Graphs & Data
The following are a number of changes made to the debt and credit aggregates, which are reflected in this and future notices:
1. As part of the continuing expansion and improvement of data in the Bank of Israel’s databases, the Information and Statistics Department has compiled historical data on the debt and credit system in the economy. As a result, the historical availability of data has been extended by more than 7 years, and data are now available as far back as September 1992, rather than December 1999. The data will be available on the Bank of Israel’s website as of the publication of this notice.[1]
2. As part of this work, there were also methodological improvements made to the current and historical data. In addition, information added to the banks’ monthly balance sheets has helped in improving data on debt. The following is a table presenting the main changes in the September 2015 data on the business sector and households[2]:
3. As of the next press release on the debt, the Information and Statistics Department will analyze the data on a quarterly frequency, and will therefore public a quarterly press release on debt developments in the economy. In parallel, monthly balance data will continue to be published on the Bank’s website on monthly frequency, but the limitations of the monthly data, as detailed below, due to which the decision was made to move to a quarterly analysis, must be taken into account:
a. The quarterly data reported by the banks are based on their balance sheets, which undergo a high level of control, and when amendments and improvements are made to the quarterly data, they are not necessarily reflected in the monthly data. Therefore, in some of the debt aggregates, the balance data during the quarter are not consistent with the balance data to the end of the quarter.
b. The monthly data are more volatile than the quarterly data, and make it difficult to compile an analysis that will properly reflect the trends in the credit market.
Business sector debt increased in November by about NIS 1 billion (0.1 percent), to about NIS 810 billion. Household debt increased in October by about NIS 3.1 billion (0.7 percent), to around NIS 472 billion at the end of the month.
The business sector’s outstanding debt
· In November, business sector debt increased by about NIS 1 billion to around NIS 810 billion. The increase derived mainly from the depreciation of the shekel against the dollar by about 0.3 percent, which increased the shekel value of debt denominated in and indexed to foreign exchange. In addition, there was net raising of debt through bank loans and nonbank loans, which were mostly offset as a result of the net repayment of tradable and non-tradable bonds in Israel and credit from abroad.
· In December, the business sector (excluding banks and insurance companies) issued about NIS 1.8 billion in bonds, all in tradable bonds. This is significantly lower than the average issuance of the first eleven months of the year (about NIS 2.5 billion).
Household debt
· Households’ outstanding debt increased by about NIS 3.1 billion (0.7 percent) in November, to about NIS 472 billion. Of that, the balance of outstanding housing debt increased by about NIS 2 billion, to about NIS 321 billion.
· In December, there was a seasonal increase in new mortgages taken out, with new mortgages totaling about NIS 5.6 billion, slightly higher than the average in the first eleven months of the year, which is about NIS 5.4 billion (see Figure 3).
The cost of the debt
· In November, the interest rate spread in the unindexed track narrowed by about 0.04 percentage points, mainly as a result of the decline in interest on outstanding credit.
· In the CPI-indexed track, the spread between the interest rate on new bank credit granted and the interest rate on deposits widened by about 0.05 percentage points in November, due to a higher increase in the interest on marginal indexed credit than the increase in interest on marginal indexed deposits.
· In December, the average spread between the yield on CPI-indexed corporate bonds—measured by the Tel Bond 60—and the yields on CPI-indexed government bonds widened to about 1.6 percentage points.
· In December, the average interest rate on new unindexed mortgages (variable-rate interest) increased by about 0.08 percentage points. The average interest rate on new CPI-indexed mortgages (fixed interest) also increase, by about 0.07 percentage points.
For links to Data and Statistics on the Bank of Israel website: