Bank of #Israel Speeds Through Foreign-Currency Purchasing Plan - Bloomberg

Bank of Israel Speeds Through Foreign-Currency Purchasing Plan - Bloomberg

The Bank of Israel bought $4.9 billion in foreign currency in February, adding to its record haul a month earlier in a bid to slow the appreciation of the shekel.

Purchases for the first two months of the year totaled about $11.7 billion, or almost 40% of the $30 billion program of interventions announced by the central bank for 2021. That helped bring reserves to a record $185 billion, or more than 45% of gross domestic product, according to a statement on Sunday.

The bank said separately that it also bought 4.4 billion shekels ($1.3 billion) in sovereign bonds last month, as part of its effort to drive down costs for government borrowing and inject liquidity in the local market. Total purchases of government bonds since the beginning of the program a year ago reached 54.8 billion shekels.