Israel investment opportunities in uncertain times

Added: 2026-05-06

[00:00:00]And moving on, many don't realize it, but Israel has actually far outperformed Wall Street over the past decade in dollar terms, and the shekele has strengthened significantly over time.

[00:00:11]So, is this a unique moment to invest in Israel's economy? Well, joining us now is Evan Lieberman, the CEO of Wise Money Israel, an SEC registered and Israel licensed investment advisory firm that works with investors around the world.

[00:00:25]Evan, it's so great to have you with us here today on the broadcast. I I just want to start by asking you for viewers who are new to this, what is Wise Money Israel and what exactly do you do for investors?

[00:00:36]>> Thanks for having me on the show. Wise Money Israel is a licensed investment firm locally here to help people around the world now in 34 different nations, invest in the Israeli stock and bond market. We help uh in English people to get connected to what's going on here, open investment accounts, get local research and understanding, and be able to tailor portfolios for their needs.

[00:00:56]And how does investing in Israel, how does that contribute to a diversified global portfolio?

[00:01:02]>> Um, ultimately people have what's called a home bias. They're generally wanting to invest in their own market, but in a globally interconnected uh society as we are, it's good to have not all your eggs in one basket, in one economy, in one uh market, in one currency. And so looking outside to a strong economy, Israel has that strong currency. We're blowing away other currencies in the last 20 years.

[00:01:24]Um, and just being able to connect with a country that you have conviction for.

[00:01:28]A lot of our clients are coming from a Christian or Judeo values based system and so they want to be part of what's going on here and that's what we enabled them to do.

[00:01:36]>> One of the things that we face that people speak about a lot is that the conflict impacts negatively the economy.

[00:01:43]How has is Israel's economy fared given that we have so many wars and so much conflict over the past few years? What's really interesting actually is that the economy um hasn't really suffered that hard from the current conflict. As you say, over the last 80 years of the modern state of Israel and before that, of course, we are crisis uh resilient.

[00:02:04]We know how to recover, adapt, uh be flexible and pivot uh in our economy.

[00:02:09]And so, actually, the GDP of Israel uh generally it's twice as much as the other OECD nations, the United States, Japan, and Canada and Britain and Germany. Uh we've actually been up at 4%, we were we came down to 1% only. We didn't contract even in a sevenfront existential war. Uh last year we came back to about 3% projected now four and a half 5%. So actually the economy structurally hasn't been affected by the war as terrible as it's been on the ground. Um and the stock market has reacted similarly. The stock market has gone up uh and the Tel Aviv 35 stock index for example last two years has gone up by 133% during the sevenfront war. And then if we add in the value of the shekele appreciating against let's say the dollar, it's gone up 188%. So it's unchallenged as far as uh the economy and the currency and the stock market honestly during this war which is confounding economists around the world.

[00:03:01]>> Now what does that mean? I mean why are people still investing in Israel that way? How is the shekele so strong after what we would expect, you know, a lay person would expect would negatively impact the economy, >> right? So the the currency of a country is actually very much reflecting of what's going on in the in the economy.

[00:03:18]Is it resilient? Is Israel able to survive against its neighbors military onslaught? How well does the economy continue to function during these times of stress? And so uh the economy is actually reflecting quite a strong and resilient uh uh backbone and that's what's really reflected in the currency.

[00:03:35]There's some structural things in Israel uh as a startup nation, as a technology exporter. uh there's always new exits of Israeli companies being sold for billions and billions of dollars bringing in new foreign currency all the time. So structurally the economy is built for a strong currency and that's actually helping our investors not only to gain on investments in companies but also in the shekele that they're investing in.

[00:03:56]>> Now I know you've mentioned before that this is almost a golden era to invest in Israel. What opportunities exist today that uh potential investors should know about?

[00:04:05]>> So the golden years of Israel I believe are still ahead of us. While we've had maybe a 22% compounded annual growth rate over the last 5 years, uh even throughout this last war, uh what we're seeing is the possibility of Abraham Accord 2.0 followon deals, uh business deals, uh trade uh deals, uh oil pipelines, exporting of some of our technologies, our military, our agricultural technologies. We have a lot of Arab neighbors that would love an excuse to make peace with us so that they can get to those technologies to help their economies to help their uh we're all living in a desert here. And so Israel is uh a worldleading in water technology in desalination obviously in military uh defense and uh cyber security. These are the new threats of the of the modern generation. Our neighbors need that and that's the renaissance I think is going to happen when they're able to make peace with us.

[00:04:54]All right, Evan Lieberman of Wise Money Israel, thank you for your insights today.

[00:04:58]>> Thanks for having me. And you can learn more by scanning the QR code to see more about Wise Money Israel, as well as download the free ultimate guide to investing in Israel or to book a consultation.