Israel: Manufacturing PMI crashes into contractionary territory in August
The Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), produced by Bank Hapoalim and the Israeli Purchasing & Logistics Managers Association (IPLMA), fell from 52.2 in July to 44.3 in August, moving below the neutral 50-mark separating expansion from contraction in the manufacturing sector.
The fall in the headline figure was driven by weaker domestic and export demand, and employment. While economists at Bank Hapoalim cautioned that summer vacations could have distorted the figures—despite seasonal adjustment—soft global trade was likely a more structural underlying factor, as many countries have seen their manufacturing sectors lose traction this year.