Israel may be a developed economy, but it is surrounded by
emerging and frontier markets. More importantly, Israel sits in a
politically volatile corner of the globe. Investors evaluating
Israel must consider geography and the country's tenuous
relationships with many of its neighbors and other nations that are
not too far away.
There are a few Israeli equities that plenty of U.S. investors
are familiar with. Teva Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:
TEVA
), SodaStream International (NASDAQ:
SODA
) and Cellcom Israel (NYSE:
CEL
) to name a few. However, there is just one ETF devoted to
America's most dependable ally in a region with precious few: The
iShares MSCI Israel Capped Investable Market Index Fund (NYSE:
EIS
).
Home to 70 stocks and $71.8 million in assets under management,
EIS is now four-and-a-half years old. That means the ETF's trading
history is long enough to get a sense for how the fund trades
following Middle East conflict, an instructive endeavor to be
sure.
Lebanon 2008 Talk about baptism by fire. Not only did EIS debut
several months before the darkest days of the global financial
crisis, but the fund was not even two months old when an 18-month
long feud in nearby Lebanon reached the breaking point. Fighting
between the government and Hezbollah lasted for two weeks and led
to dozens of casualties.
Remarkably, EIS traded higher during the Lebanon conflict. When
the fighting ended, EIS was trading just below $56. A week later it
was flirting with $59. The good times ended there as EIS's share
price would be cut in half by late November 2008. It should be
noted that in 2008 Israel was still classified as an emerging
market and that may have contributed to the ETF's slide.
Yemen's al-Qaeda Crackdown Yemen is more than 1,300 miles away
from Israel, but the former is home to ongoing conflicts that
cannot be glossed over. In early 2010, the Yemeni government joined
forces with the U.S. in effort to rid the country of al-Qaeda
loyalists after nation played unfortunate host to the 2000 bombing
of the USS Cole, among other terrorist acts.
Since there was a revolution in Yemen last year and fighting
started again earlier this year, it is hard to pinpoint a date when
fighting there stopped. This much is clear: EIS was trading around
$54 in late January 2010 and was below $50 by the time the first
battle of Lawdar ended in late August 2010.
Egypt 2011 Tel Aviv is just 250 miles from Cairo, so it is not
surprising that civil and political unrest in Egypt can adversely
impact Israeli equities. That is exactly during the Arab Spring of
2011. The anti-Mubarak movement started to gain steam in February
2011. From February 18 through the end of the year, EIS plunged
30.5 percent.
Over the same time, the Market Vectors Egypt ETF (NYSE: EPGT)
tumbled 49.1 percent. Neither ETF has gotten back to its pre-Arab
Spring highs, but it is worth nothing
EGPT is one of the top-performing non-leveraged
ETFs in 2012
.
Syria 2012 At 133 miles away, Tel Aviv is closer to Damascus,
Syria than it is to Cairo and that proximity can be a thorny issue
to say the least. The country is in the midst of an uprising that
began in March 2011 and by some estimates has claimed more than
20,000 lives.
The summer months were particularly bloody as more than 2,900
deaths were reported in June and nearly 2,800 in July. EIS traded
lower for most of June and July, but the ETF found a bottom in July
and has proceeded to traded slightly higher from there.
For more on Middle East news and how it impacts ETFs, click
here
.
(c) 2012 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice.
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