Tel Aviv Stock Exchange's New Closing Phase Grows, Retail Investors Remain Absent
The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) is analyzing why retail investors participate minimally in the new Trading at Last (TAL) closing phase. Data shows retail investors account for only 5% of the total trading volume during TAL, amounting to 185 million shekels since the start of 2026, despite representing about 12% of overall daily trading volumes on the exchange. The average daily TAL trading volume in 2026 has risen to 108 million shekels, a 53% increase from 71 million shekels in 2025, reflecting both growing adoption of TAL and overall market volume increases.
Since TAL's launch in August 2025, approximately 22 billion shekels have traded during this closing phase. Yaniv Pagot, TASE's trading manager, noted that retail investors generally underuse sophisticated order types that could benefit them, partly due to lack of familiarity and accessibility. Retail investors, who independently trade securities for personal accounts, have become a significant force in the Israeli market, with nearly one million retail accounts now active, representing about 10% of Israel's population.
TAL introduces a 5-6 minute window after the closing auction where the closing price is known, allowing investors to trade at that fixed price without specifying a price themselves. However, retail investors tend to avoid TAL because their trading priorities differ from institutional investors. For institutions, foreign investors, and especially passive funds, the closing price is crucial for index calculations, asset valuations, and benchmarking. TAL helps these players reduce tracking errors and price uncertainty by enabling trades after the closing price is set.
The TAL initiative, led by CEO Itay Ben Zeev, aims to align TASE's trading structure with major global exchanges and facilitate institutional and foreign investor participation. Foreign investors currently account for 35% of TAL trading volume, averaging 1.1 billion shekels daily in 2026, and about 27% of overall equity market trading in January 2026. The exchange expects foreign participation to continue growing. Overall, all asset classes combined see 6.2 billion shekels traded during the closing phase, with 4 billion shekels attributed to foreign investors.
