News Brief

(IsraelNN.com) The shekel-dollar rate dipped below 3.24 Thursday for the first time since November 20, 2006, and closed at 3.247, or almost 31 cents to the shekel. The dollar has been sinking for a month, after fetching 3.60 shekels when Bank of Israel Governor Prof. Stanley Fischer announced a new policy of the Bank's intervening  in foreign currency trading and buying dollars in order to keep a stronger shekel from hurting exports.

He previously has avoided intervention, arguing that it is best for the currency to find its own level in free-market trading. Analysts said that the lack of intervention when the shekel-dollar rate dropped below 3.35 touched off further selling of the dollar. "The market in general thought 3.33-3.34 was a line in the sand for the Bank of Israel," said Nandita Singh, an emerging markets strategist at JP Morgan Chase. "When they didn't intervene, that emboldened investors to sell dollar-shekel."