Israel’s stock market drops as exit polls show no clear election winner — SkimNews
Get the Finance newsletter
Daily finance — markets, central banks, M&A, the prints that move money. Free.
- Tel Aviv 125 dropped as much as 3.5% in early Wednesday trading as investors weighed unclear results in Israel’s first parliamentary election since the start of its genocidal war on Gaza.
- Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition was on course to win 54 seats, while Gadi Eisenkot’s opposition bloc was headed for 47, with more than 76% of votes counted at 09:30 GMT.
- Knesset needed 61 seats for a majority in the unicameral 26th parliament, and neither Netanyahu’s coalition nor Eisenkot’s bloc appeared on track to win one.
- Israel recorded GDP growth of 2.9% in 2025 and 3.2% in the first half of 2026, with the economy running hot despite three years on a war footing and an influx of local tech investment.
- Bank of Israel raised its GDP growth forecast for all of 2026 from 4% to 5.6%, citing ramped-up production by Israeli firms overseas.
- Bank of Israel forecast 7.5% GDP growth for 2027, far surpassing estimates for the United States, United Kingdom, Germany and Japan.
Why it matters: For Netanyahu, the projected coalition total leaves a seven-seat gap to the 61 needed for a majority, while investors marked Israeli equities down by as much as 3.5%. The Bank of Israel’s 5.6% forecast for 2026 and 7.5% projection for 2027 underline that the immediate market move tracked political uncertainty rather than reported economic weakness.
Ask SkimNews
