Photo: The lobby of the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange. Photo: Yaniv Morozovsky via Wikimedia Commons.

JNS.org – Israel’s economy had its strongest quarterly performance since 2013, the country’s Central Bureau of Statistics said Thursday.

The economy grew by an annualized 6.2 percent in the last quarter of 2016, 4.2 percent in the third quarter, and 5.3 percent in the second quarter. The data showed that, year on year, the economy grew 5 percent in the second half of 2016, following 3.2-percent growth in the first half of the year.

The increase in gross domestic product in the second half of 2016 reflected a 3.5-percent increase in public consumption, and 2.9-percent growth in private consumption per capita. Israel’s exports of goods and services, excluding diamonds and start-ups, were up 4.5 percent in 2016, and investments in fixed assets climbed 10.2 percent. Imports of goods and services went up 10.6 percent in the second half of 2016, the report said.