Borsa Istanbul up at Thursday open

By Aysu Bicer

ANKARA (AA) – Turkey's benchmark stock index opened at 1,548.04 points on Thursday, up 0.48% or 7.45 points from the previous close.

Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index ended Wednesday at 1,540.59 points, a slight decrease of 0.14%, with a daily trading volume of 30.9 billion Turkish liras (nearly $4.4 billion).

The US dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate fell to 6.9850 as of 9:30 a.m. local time (0630GMT), from 7.0040 at the previous close.

The euro/Turkish lira exchange rate also dropped to 8.4140 from 8.4290, while one British pound traded for 9.6960 Turkish liras, down from 9.7200.

One barrel of Brent crude oil sold for around $64.91 as of 10 a.m. local time (0700GMT).