Israel
There are loads of different ways to invest in Israeli companies these days
By BERNIE BELLAN
With everything that’s been happening in the world this year, one would think that this might not be the best of times to think about investment opportunities in Israel.
Yet, as I’m sure you’re aware, for years now Israeli high-tech start-ups have continued to dazzle with their performance – and have attracted large-scale investments from some of the world’s foremost investors, including Warren Buffet and Bill Gates.
Is now a good time to invest in Israel you might ask yourself?
The answer is there’s probably never been a better time.
Until the Coronavirus pandemic took hold around the world Israeli companies were on pace to attract more investment capital this year than any other year – and 2019 had been a record year for investment in Israel. Over $8 billion had been invested in 522 different Israeli high-tech companies last year, which was almost $2 billion more than had been invested the previous year. It had been the best year for investment in Israel since 2013. (To give an idea how much investment in Israeli high-tech has grown in the past ten years, total investment in that sector was just a little over $2 billion in 2010.)
As Jews, we can be rightfully proud of how well Israeli companies have done in recent years. Here are just some facts of which you might not be aware:
• In an area roughly the same size as the state of New Jersey, Israel’s population is now over 9 million.
• Total GDP in 2019 was $410 billion.
• GDP per capita was $44,474
• Israel has the third most companies listed on the NASDAQ: 250 (after only the United States and China)
• Tel Aviv is the world’s most important tech sector after Silicon Valley
• Israeli institutions of higher learning are among the world leaders in producing start-up talent.
• Israelis have won 12 Nobel Prizes
• In the last 10 years salaries for Israeli professionals working in the high-tech sector have gone up 300%. As a result, the “brain drain” that had been seeing so many Israelis leaving for greener pastures, especially Silicon Valley in the U.S., has been substantially reduced.
Unfortunately, as in almost every other area of the world, economic growth in Israel has been dealt an enormous blow by the Coronavirus.
The International Monetary Fund predicts that Israel’s growth rate will shrink by 6.3% in 2020. This will be the first year in 25 years that Israel will have experienced a negative growth rate.
With all that being said, however, I’ve often wondered how an individual investor who might not have any specialized background in investing in Israel might be able to invest in Israeli companies. From time to time I’ve been approached to write about various Israeli companies. Just recently, for instance, I wrote about a company called “Waterways”, which was seeking to expand in Canada.
And, as you might well imagine, being in the media, of late I’ve been receiving loads of requests from Israeli companies to publicize products that are related to combating the Coronavirus pandemic. I’ve been reluctant to do that though, as it would be difficult to decide how to feature certain companies and not others.
A couple of weeks back though, I was invited to watch a webinar focusing on Israeli technology companies. It was extremely interesting – and it didn’t involve the promotion of any particular companies, so it wasn’t as if anyone watching that particular webinar was being directed to invest in certain companies. As a matter of fact, the facts about Israel that are cited at the beginning of this article all came from information provided during that webinar.
At one point toward the end of the webinar, however, I was somewhat startled to learn that, as much as non-Israeli investors regard Israel as home to some fabulous investment opportunities, that isn’t the case for many Israelis themselves.
One of the individuals participating in the webinar was someone by the name of Tomer Nitzan, who is the presiding officer for the U.S. – Israel desk of BDO, one of the world’s leading accounting and consulting firms.
Nitzan noted that Canadians have long had a tradition of making major investments in Israeli companies, including the late David Azraeli of Montreal, who opened the first ever shopping centre in Israel (and whom I also had the pleasure of meeting around the time that the Malha Mall, also known as the Jerusalem Mall, was being built), along with many other shopping centres in Israel; the Koffler family, which owns the Superpharm chain in Israel; and the Bronfman family, which had owned Koor Industries until 2016 and now owns large stakes in several Israeli technology firms.
However, Nitzan noted that, while foreign investors are often quite willing to risk capital in Israeli companies, the same can’t be said for large scale Israeli investment firms themselves.
Here’s how Nitzan explained what he described as an “anomaly”: “Israeli employees fund every month huge amounts of money into their pension funds, which are run by insurance companies in Israel, so there’s tons of institutional money in Israel.
“There’s always a fight with the government, which wants to make them invest in Israeli tech – because it should be natural for them. It is happening – but to a very small extent. It hasn’t happened on a large scale, and there’s really no reason.
“The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange has been very good the past five years for raising money for American real estate.
“It’s a shame that our (Israelis’) pension money is actually going into mega U.S. real estate deals”- but hardly at all into Israeli companies themselves.
Go figure.
Another one of the participants in the webinar was Ronnie Jaegermann, (about whom I wrote somewhat in my article about Waterways back in January). Jaegermann has been especially interested in tapping into the Canadian investment market when it comes to finding capital for Israeli companies. During the webinar he noted that over $30 million was raised in Canada last year for investment in Israeli companies.
Jaegermann also pointed out that most of the funding for companies that have started up in Israel and require further capital comes from private sources, not from IPOs (Initial Public Offerings).
But, I got to thinking: Where could an individual investor who wanted to put some money into Israeli companies go if they weren’t a mega investor, but were just looking for some good investment opportunities while, at the same time, doing something good for Israel?
During the webinar to which I referred the name “OurCrowd” came up a couple of times – with reference to exactly the kind of investment vehicle about which I was interested in writing.
I Googled “CrowdFund” and here’s what I came up with: “OurCrowd was started in 2013, driven by the idea that the business of building startups grows bigger and better when the global ‘crowd’ gains access to VC (Venture Capital)-level investment opportunities.
“Today, OurCrowd is a leading equity crowdfunding platform for investing in global startups, led by serial entrepreneur Jon Medved and run by a team of seasoned investment professionals. Offering unprecedented access to startup investing, individual investors through OurCrowd are fueling innovations that change the way people work, travel, shop, heal, and conduct business. OurCrowd investors participate in these opportunities alongside VCs and institutional co-investors, at the same terms.”
Now, while OurCrowd doesn’t restrict itself to Israeli investment opportunities alone, it does invest heavily in Israeli companies.
I spoke with David Shore, Vice President, Investor Relations, for the Toronto based Canadian division of OurCrowd, to ask how many Israeli companies have there been to date in which OurCrowd has invested?
Shore told me the answer was “over 200”. He added that the ratio of investment in Israeli companies to Global companies by OurCrowd was roughly 50/50
It turns our that OurCrowd is a great vehicle for investing in Israeli start-ups. The minimum investment required to invest in one particular company is only $10,000 US and, if you want to invest in an OurCrowd fund, which invests in an array of Israeli companies, the minimum investment is $50,000US.
There are certain other conditions an investor in Canada would need to meet, however, since OurCrowd in Canada falls under the jurisdiction of the Ontario Securities Commission, which does require that any investor in a fund such as this needs to meet at least one of several criteria, including: a minimum individual income of $200,000 a year or joint income with a spouse of at least $300,000; or a net worth (outside of property owned) of at least $1 million.
If you meet those criteria, you can invest in Israeli start-ups through OurCrowd on a “deal by deal basis” or in a “venture fund” which invests in different sectors of the Israeli economy.
Shore noted that recently one of the venture funds begun by OurCrowd is a $100m “pandemic innovation fund”. One of the companies that’s in that fund is “the Israeli front runner for the corona vaccine – MigVax,” he said.
It’s relatively easy to get started with OurCrowd. It can all be done directly through their website: www.ourcrowd.com, or on the OurCrowd app. I would suggest that if you are interested in OurCrowd, however, you speak with David Shore, who can be reached either at david.shore@ourcrowd.com or at 1-647-777-1430.
Finally, in searching for vehicles through which one might invest in Israeli companies, I did come across two Exchange Traded Funds which invest in a wide range of Israeli technology companies. In both cases though, these funds invest in mature Israeli technology companies that have all achieved a level of success, not start-ups or mid-growth level companies.
The first ETF is known as IZRL ARK Israel Innovative Technology ETF. It was started in December 2017 and has enjoyed 22.5% growth since then.
The other ETF is known as ITEQ BlueStar Israel Technology ETF. It was created in November 2015 and has enjoyed 89.7% growth since then.
Both ETFs can be purchased in Canada through brokerages, including the self-directed branches of the major Canadian banks.
So – even though times may be tough for many of us, there are always individuals who are looking for good investment opportunities. For years now Israeli companies have enjoyed spectacular success, especially in the high tech sector (but also in other sectors, such as natural gas). Whether or not investing in Israeli companies is something that might be of interest to you, ever since the release of “Start-Up Nation” in 2009, the Israeli investment scene has caught the attention of millions of investors throughout the world. Now, with a range of investment opportunities in Israel that are available to even small investors, it would be possible to benefit from that small country’s prodigious intellectual capital.
Israel
Israel report by former Winnipegger Bruce Brown
10 minutes
(Posted Dec. 24, 2024)
02:11 AM: Sound asleep.
2.11.01 AM: Wide awake. Awoken by a blaring missile alarm. Incoming. Took me no time to react. Ivan Pavlov would be proud. I quickly scooped up my dog. Grabbed my glasses. An inhaler. My phone and power cord. And sprinted to the safe room. Right across the hall. My wife overseas on vacation. So did this one alone. Er with my dog. We have 90 seconds to reach safety so no real panic, relatively speaking.
2.11.09 AM: In my safe room. Slid shut the heavy steel slabs across the window. You can hear this happening throughout the building. Kinda like a horror movie. Screech. Slam. Screech. Slam. Screech. Slam. Then mine. Screech. Slam. Next I jumped across the room and slammed shut the heavy, reinforced, steel door. It also makes a slamming sound, a really loud one. Then slumped down on the couch with my dog. With some level of relief. Where is this missile coming from. Can’t be from Gaza, they don’t have the capability anymore…I hope. Nor Lebanon, living too far south…I hope. Yemen? Possible. Those dang Houthis?
2. 14 AM: Oh oh. Need to pee. Like really bad. Once in the safe room, you should stay there for ten minutes. Unless there is another siren. Each siren requires a ten minute respite. Respite? Odd choice of words as you are not really resting. Way too tense. Especially as you can occasionally hear the booms of intercepted missiles up above. Kind of unnerving. Back to my need to pee. Its quite dangerous leaving the room during this period. Should your place be hit by the missile or falling debris from the sky. You don’t want to be caught with your pants down, literally, hovering over your toilet. And condos have been hit in Rehovot with some death and much destruction. Hmmm. To pee or not to pee. That is the question. Whether tis better to suffer the pangs of having to pee or the missiles of outrageous fortune. You get the point.
2.14.10 AM: Peeing in the bathroom.
2.14.40 AM: Back in the safe room. With my dog. Sitting on the couch. Fiddling with the remote control. I work in hi tech. The semiconductor world which can be pretty complex. But I simply have not mastered the remote. Really want to see what’s going on. Where is the missile from. Are there more attacks elsewhere in the country. Pushing this button and that button But the TV still off. Okay. Will check my cell. Although the connection sometimes comes and goes when shuttered in the heavily reinforced concrete and steel safe room. Works! Ya! Showing three bars. Sometimes four. Checking my feeds. But no news yet.
2.17 AM: Seriously. I need to pee again. Like really bad. Dang prostate! To pee or not to pee. That is the question…. You get the point. I chose to pee. This time I don’t actually slam shut the heavy, reinforced, steel door. And my dog follows me out. This could get complicated. But first things first.
2.17.10 AM: Peeing in the bathroom.
2.17.40 AM: Chasing after my dog around the condo. Poncho!!! There he is. In the living room. Like master. Like pet. He too is relieving himself. Probably the tension. Dogs can sense these things. “Faster Poncho!. Faster!” I encourage him.
2,18.02 AM: We’re back in the safe room. The heavy, reinforced, steel door slammed shut. And then I start worrying. What if I have to pee again. Its really dangerous out there. Idea! I’ll bring a cleaning pail in here. And if worse comes to worse. Well, I am alone. Sans my dog.
2.18.22 AM: I dart for the cleaning cabinet in the bathroom to grab the pail. Making sure the heavy, reinforced, steel door is shut less my dog run out again. Wait! As it dawns on me at 02.18.22 AM. This is not the smartest thing to do. At least I could have combined grabbing the pail with actually having to pee again. Like maybe I could hold out for the next three minutes or so in the safe room. No urgent need for the pail. But I am already there….
2.18.25 AM: Grab the red cleaning pail
2.18.28 AM: Back in the safe room. The heavy, reinforced, steel door slammed shut again. Siting on the couch with my dog again. Red pail glaring at me from the side of the room…daring me. But my bladder is relaxed. I try the remote again. I feel like my 85 year old mother who often complains about getting her remote to work. I console myself thinking that it must be the batteries. Hmmm. Maybe a mad rush for the utility room to get some new batteries. But that would be mad. I’ll take care of it in the morning. Only a few more minutes and I can safely leave the safe room and go back to bed.
2.19.45 AM: I pour myself a glass of mineral water. This I store in the safe room per Homefront commands. Fresh batteries not, hrmph. As I down the water I realize this is probably not the best idea. Less it creates the urge to pee…. Alas no. Start surfing my feed again. The intercontinental missile was fired by those crazy, dang Houthis from Yemen. All of central Israel sent to their safe rooms. Dang Houthis! The next couple minutes go by pretty smoothly. Although seems like an eternity.
2.21 AM: Back in bed. Albeit sleep comes slowly as my adrenaline starts to reside.
As it were. Israel bombed the dang Houthis that night. For the third time since the outbreak of the war. In retaliation for them firing over 200 ballistic missiles and 170 drones at Israel, which fortunately had not resulted in much damage. We struck them with over 60 bombs in two air raid sorties. Destroying mainly military targets as well as ports and energy infrastructure. Maybe that will teach them for waking me -and a million other Israelis- in the middle of the night.
As it were. Falling debris from the dang Houthi attack landed on a school in central Israel, forcing its collapse. Fortunately and thank G-d it was the middle of the night. Sometime between 2:11 AM and 2.21 AM. So no casualties. Can’t even imagine the tragedy had this strike occurred mid-day.
As it were. I changed the batteries in the remote. It works just fine now. And I left the red cleaning pail in the safe room….just in case. But I hope the dang Houthis finally learned their lesson. Although probably not.
As it were. Two nights later. Another 2:00AM missile from the dang Houthis. . They just wont let me sleep….
As it is. Please continue donating to the Israeli war and revival efforts. You may have given earlier. But give again. The financial costs to Israel are and will be billions. Billions! Sderot and Metulla and Tel Avi and Haifa are Israel’s front lines. Israel is the diaspora’s front line.
Bruce Brown. A Canadian. And an Israeli. Bruce made Aliyah…a long time ago. He works in Israel’s hi-tech sector by day and, in spurts, is a somewhat inspired writer by night. Bruce is the winner of the 2019 American Jewish Press Association Simon Rockower Award for excellence in writing. And wrote the 1998 satire, An Israeli is…. Bruce’s reflects on life in Israel – political, social, economic and personal. With lots of biting, contrarian, sardonic and irreverent insight
Israel
Join the Masa Canadian Professionals Volunteers Program!
You are invited on a 4-week volunteer program in Israel from October 14th to November 10th. Help rebuild Israeli society post-October 7th over Canadian Thanksgiving, Sukkot, and Simchat Torah. Spend three weeks based in Tel Aviv and one week based in Eilat!
This program is exclusively for Jewish professionals aged 22-50, working at Jewish organizations or remotely in any field.
The cost of the program is $150 USD to the organizer and $50 USD to Masa. Participants will receive a Masa grant of $2650 USD that is applied to participation and to cover additional costs. The cost of the program includes housing, meals while volunteering, transportation on travel days, health insurance, leadership training, and more. Volunteers are required to commit to the volunteer schedule, with the understanding that there will be the flexibility to work remotely for 8 specific days during the program. Flights are not included but you get a 15% discount from El Al.
Sign up here: https://www.masaisrael.org/go/canada-jp/ space is limited!
Don’t miss this unique opportunity to make a difference and connect with fellow professionals. For more information, contact Mahla Finkleman, National Manager of Partnerships and Outreach, Masa Canada, atmfinkleman@ujafed.org and/or Sam Goodman, Senior Manager of Israel Engagement, sgoodman@ujafed.org.
Save the Dates for Info Sessions:
- Thursday, September 5th, 12:00 – 12:30 EST
- Wednesday, September 11th, 12:00 – 12:30 EST
Join us in Israel for a meaningful and impactful experience with Masa!
weeks based in Tel Aviv and one week based in Eilat!
This program is exclusively for Jewish professionals aged 22-50, working at Jewish organizations or remotely in any field.
The cost of the program is $150 USD to the organizer and $50 USD to Masa. Participants will receive a Masa grant of $2650 USD that is applied to participation and to cover additional costs. The cost of the program includes housing, meals while volunteering, transportation on travel days, health insurance, leadership training, and more. Volunteers are required to commit to the volunteer schedule, with the understanding that there will be the flexibility to work remotely for 8 specific days during the program. Flights are not included but you get a 15% discount from El Al.
Sign up here: https://www.masaisrael.org/go/canada-jp/ space is limited!
Don’t miss this unique opportunity to make a difference and connect with fellow professionals. For more information, contact Mahla Finkleman, National Manager of Partnerships and Outreach, Masa Canada, atmfinkleman@ujafed.org and/or Sam Goodman, Senior Manager of Israel Engagement, sgoodman@ujafed.org.
Save the Dates for Info Sessions:
- Thursday, September 5th, 12:00 – 12:30 EST
- Wednesday, September 11th, 12:00 – 12:30 EST
Join us in Israel for a meaningful and impactful experience with Masa!
Features
New website for Israelis interested in moving to Canada
By BERNIE BELLAN (May 21, 2024) A new website, titled “Orvrim to Canada” (https://www.ovrimtocanada.com/ovrim-en) has been receiving hundreds of thousands of visits, according to Michal Harel, operator of the website.
In an email sent to jewishpostandnews.ca Michal explained the reasons for her having started the website:
“In response to the October 7th events, a group of friends and I, all Israeli-Canadian immigrants, came together to launch a new website supporting Israelis relocating to Canada. “Our website, https://www.ovrimtocanada.com/, offers a comprehensive platform featuring:
- Step-by-step guides for starting the immigration process
- Settlement support and guidance
- Community connections and networking opportunities
- Business relocation assistance and expert advice
- Personal blog sharing immigrants’ experiences and insights
“With over 200,000 visitors and media coverage from prominent Israeli TV channels and newspapers, our website has already made a significant impact in many lives.”
A quick look at the website shows that it contains a wealth of information, almost all in Hebrew, but with an English version that gives an overview of what the website is all about.
The English version also contains a link to a Jerusalem Post story, published this past February, titled “Tired of war? Canada grants multi-year visas to Israelis” (https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-787914#google_vignette) That story not only explains the requirements involved for anyone interested in moving to Canada from Israel, it gives a detailed breakdown of the costs one should expect to encounter.
(Updated May 28)
We contacted Ms. Harel to ask whether she’s aware whether there has been an increase in the number of Israelis deciding to emigrate from Israel since October 7. (We want to make clear that we’re not advocating for Israelis to emigrate; we’re simply wanting to learn more about emigration figures – and whether there has been a change in the number of Israelis wanting to leave the country.)
Ms. Harel referred us to a website titled “Globes”: https://www.globes.co.il/news/article.aspx?did=1001471862
The website is in Hebrew, but we were able to translate it into English. There is a graph on the website showing both numbers of immigrants to Israel and emigrants.
The graph shows a fairly steady rate of emigration from 2015-2022, hovering in the 40,000 range, then in 2023 there’s a sudden increase in the number of emigrants to 60,000.
According to the website, the increase in emigrants is due more to a change in the methodology that Israel has been using to count immigrants and emigrants than it is to any sudden upsurge in emigration. (Apparently individuals who had formerly been living in Israel but who may have returned to Israel just once a year were being counted as having immigrated back to Israel. Now that they are no longer being counted as immigrants and instead are being treated as emigrants, the numbers have shifted radically.)
Yet, the website adds this warning: “The figures do not take into account the effects of the war, since it is still not possible to identify those who chose to emigrate following it. It is also difficult to estimate what Yalad Yom will produce – on the one hand, anti-Semitism and hatred of Jews and Israelis around the world reminds everyone where the Jewish home is. On the other hand, the bitter truth we discovered in October is that it was precisely in Israel, the safe fortress of the Jewish people, that a massacre took place reminding us of the horrors of the Holocaust. And if that’s not enough, the explosive social atmosphere and the difference in the state budget deficit, which will inevitably lead to a heavy burden of taxes and a reduction in public services, may convince Zionist Israelis that they don’t belong here.”
Thus, as much as many of us would be disappointed to learn that there is now an upsurge in Israelis wanting to move out of the country, once reliable figures begin to be produced for 2024, we shouldn’t be surprised to learn that is the case – which helps to explain the tremendous popularity of Ms. Harel’s website.
You must be logged in to post a comment Login