​The Bank of Israel's Composite State of the Economy Index for June increased by 0.14 percent, an increase that reflects a moderate pace of expansion. The Index was positively affected by increases in the import of consumer goods (June), the import of manufacturing inputs (June), and employee posts (April). In addition, this increase also reflects the job vacancy rate in June, which remained at a record high for the fourth consecutive month, which in turn reflects the continued desire of businesses (other than in the incoming tourism industry) to expand their operations following the opening of the economy.  In contrast, goods exports (June), the services revenue index (May), the retail trade revenue index (May), the Industrial Production index (May), services exports (April), and building starts (March) declined, which had a negative impact on the index.

 

The index reading for May was revised slightly downward, due to the negative figures for the Industrial Production index and the revenue indices, which were impacted, apparently on a one-time basis, by Operation Guardian of the Walls.  In contrast, the figure for April was revised slightly upward (Table 1).

 

Table 2 presents the development of components of the Index in the past few months.

 

In view of the uniqueness of the crisis and the resulting measurement difficulties, the changes in the Index should not be used as an indicator of the precise intensity of changes in economic activity, and particularly not regarding the relative intensity between various months.

 

 

Table 1: Revisions in the Composite Index

Revision

Previous figure

New figure

June

 

0.14

May

0.24

0.11

April

0.34

0.42

March

0.45

0.46

February

0.29

0.26

January 2021

-0.57

-0.57

 

 

 

 

 

Table 2: Changes in the Index components in recent months♦

(monthly percent change, unless otherwise noted)

 

June 2021

May 2021

April 2021

March 2021

Industrial Production Index

(excluding mining and quarrying)

 

-1.7

-1.1

2.7

Services Revenue Index

(excluding education and public administration)

 

-1.7

3.0

5.0

Retail Trade Revenue Index

 

-4.3

2.4

2.0

Imports of consumer goods1

3.4

-0.8

4.3

6.9

Imports of manufacturing inputs

(excluding fuels)1

6.6

4.6

-0.8

2.9

Goods exports (excluding agriculture)1

-8.6

3.6

5.5

3.0

Services exports (excluding transportation)2

 

 

-0.4

-3.2

Number of employee posts in the private sector

 

 

2.0

3.8

Job vacancy rate in the business sector3

4.8

4.6

4.4

4.1

Building starts4

 

 

 

-15.5

 

1 Goods imports and exports are calculated in fixed prices (adjusted for changes in foreign trade price indices).

2 Services exports are calculated in real terms using the Consumer Price Index, and are comprised of the export of other business services and the export of tourism services.

3 The job vacancy rate is calculated out of the total number of employed people, and is included in the index at its seasonally adjusted level.  The figures for March and April are not seasonally adjusted, since the Central Bureau of Statistics did not calculate a seasonal adjustment for those months due to the exceptional change in the figure.

4 Since the Central Bureau of Statistics publishes data on building starts once per quarter, the data integrated into the model are at a monthly frequency based on additional sources, such that the distribution is consistent with the quarterly data published by the Central Bureau of Statistics (in percent, seasonally adjusted).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Detailed explanations regarding how the Composite Index is calculated, as well as detailed long-term tables, can be found at

https://www.boi.org.il/en/Research/Pages/ind.aspx

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