Borsa Istanbul goes up at close

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey’s Borsa Istanbul benchmark index was up 0.23 percent at the close of its daily session on Friday in line with advances seen in emerging market indexes.

The BIST 100 index rose 170.37 points to close at 74.363,45 points with the total trading volume reaching 3 billion Turkish liras (around $1 billion).

Among the sub-indexes of BIST 100, the information technology sector was the worst performer with 1.24 decline, while the best performer was the communication sector shares with the index seeing 1.46 advance.

The Turkish lira was relatively flat against the U.S. dollar on Friday to trade at 3.4498 compared to 3.4536 at the open of markets after the Turkey’s Central Bank on Thursday introduced rate hikes to stem the slide of Turkish lira against other foreign exchanges.

The bank has hiked its policy rate by a 50 basis points to 8 percent from 7.5 percent; the overnight lending rate to 8.5 percent from 8.25 percent, while leaving the borrowing rate, under which banks lend or deposit money to the Central Bank, unchanged at 7.25 percent.