Articles by February, 2022

A day after the announcement of the signing of a memorandum of understanding between El Al and Arkia, it seems that the completion of the move faces significant obstacles. Among EL AL employees, there was unequivocal opposition to the outline of the emerging agreement that would allow Arkia employees to hold EL AL shares. According to the agreement, the merger between El Al and Arkia will be done by an exchange of shares, so Ask Al will acquire full ownership in Arkia in exchange for allocating 10% -14% of its shares after the merger to Arkia owners: the Nakash family (70%) and a strawberry...

The night between Sunday and Monday almost completely reduced the validity of the "green mark" that Israeli citizens were asked to display at the entrance to public and closed places, thus removing another significant part of the restrictions that accompanied the Corona period in general and the Omicron wave in particular. The decision was made by the Corona Cabinet in parallel with the gradual decrease in the number of infections and the coefficient of infection, which has fallen below 1 in recent days. In its decision to abolish the green label, the government was assisted by the backing...

The number of corona patients in critical condition has decreased slightly and stands at 1,254. In the morning a record was set when 1,263 positive for Corona were hospitalized in critical condition, and as of the evening hours 288 of the critically ill patients are connected to respirators. Data from the Ministry of Health show that at midnight 30,924 positive for Corona were diagnosed. This brings the number of verified persons from the beginning of the year to 1,805,109. This is an average of almost 49,000 positives a day. On Sunday, another 16 corona patients died and the number of...

During January, there was a noticeable decline in business activity in Israel. Ruthi Bank Automated announced that there was a decrease of nearly 12% in credit card expenses in January - in the expenses of Israelis in businesses. In contrast, there was an increase in expenses in online transactions, which brings the monthly decrease compared to December to only 3.3%. There was also a decrease in the withdrawal of cash from ATMs, at a rate of about 12%. What is more interesting is the fact that this is the third month in a row that such a decline has been recorded, which may indicate a...

The Austrian-based company Tricentis has announced the acquisition of the Israeli start-up Testim, which has developed an AI-based platform for testing automation offered as a cloud service. The value of the deal is estimated at $ 200 million. Testing will expand Tricentis' testing platform and help it simplify their automation and enable organizations to perform rigorous end-to-end testing quickly and easily. Trisentis customers will now have the flexibility to choose products and services that suit their needs, in a local installation model with a fee for annual licensing or in a cloud...

Finance Minister Avigdor Lieberman and Prime Minister Naftali Bennett present their new economic plan. At the center of the program are two significant steps: tax cuts for those who earn up to the level of the average wage in Israel and the second step - a new compensation outline for self-employed people who were injured during the Omicron crisis. The cost of the program is estimated by the Treasury at NIS 4 billion in terms of loss of revenue. The core of the plan is, as mentioned, a reduction in taxes on work for those who earn low wages and a reduction in caps. Prime Minister Naftali...

After 32 days in which more than 30,000 verified patients were diagnosed each day, Thursday 27,723 positives were diagnosed for Corona. The coefficient of infection continues to decline slowly and stands at 0.76. The dismal figure is that since the beginning of the year, 1,980,823 positives have been diagnosed in Corona in Israel, and for some 182,000 of them this was not the first time they have been infected with the virus. Data from the Ministry of Health show that there has been a further decrease in the number of patients in a difficult and positive situation for Corona. As of noon,...

In January 2022, there was a sharp decrease in the volume of mortgages taken by Israelis compared to December, when an all-time record of mortgages by homebuyers was set. This could indicate the purchase of fewer apartments at the beginning of 2022 than in the last months of 2021. Data from the Bank of Israel published today (Sunday) show that in January the public took out almost NIS 10 billion in housing loans (to be exact: NIS 9.966 billion), compared with NIS 12.219 billion in December 2021. In November the public took NIS 10.985 billion, in October NIS 10.688 billion and in the...

The Ministerial Committee for Legislation approved in a telephone poll between the ministers the amendments to the legislation agreed as part of the package deal in the economy. Among other things, under the program, the minimum wage will gradually increase to NIS 6,000 by the end of 2025 in five installments. On April 1 this year, the minimum wage in Israel will rise to NIS 5,400. The increase is less than 2%, while in 2021 inflation was measured at 2.8% in Israel and since the beginning of the year there have been further increases, such as property taxes, fuel and electricity. The next...

Matthias Korman, Secretary General of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), arrived at a cabinet meeting in Jerusalem today and presented a presentation to the Prime Minister and government ministers on the impact of the corona on the Israeli economy. In the presentation, data were presented to the ministers, according to which the increase in employment in the past year was higher than the average of the other OECD countries. So while the employment rate for ages 25-64 in Israel is about 75%, the average in the member states of the organization is about 70%....