By Muhammed Ali Gurtas
ANKARA (AA) - Turkey's benchmark stock index started the week with a 420.10-point hike to open at 110,175.25 points on Monday.
Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index increased by 0.38 percent at open while the BIST banking and holding indexes rose 0.40 and 0.07 percent, respectively.
Among all sectors, the BIST mining index was the best performer, up 1.13 percent and the sports sector started the day with the biggest decline, losing 0.05 percent.
At Friday's close, the BIST 100 went up 601.23 points -- 0.55 percent -- to reach 109,755.14 points, with a total trading volume of 3.8 billion Turkish liras (nearly $1.1 billion).
Meanwhile, the U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate stood at 3.4470 at 11.20 a.m. local time (0820GMT) Monday, compared with 3.4590 at Friday’s close.
Last Friday, the lira hit an eight-month high against the dollar and the U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate fell below 3.45 after market close.