Turkey's Borsa Istanbul ends day with gains

By Muhammed Ali Gurtas

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey's benchmark stock index closed Friday up 0.36 percent at 89,897.67 points with a 6.92 billion Turkish lira ($1.42 billion) trade volume.

Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index ended the week with a 326.42-point hike from Thursday's close of 89,571.25 points, while it started the last trading day of the week at 89,998.60 points.

The benchmark index hovered between 89,317.48 points and 91,021.31 points during the trading hours, while 59 stocks on the BIST 100 were on the rise, 27 fell, and 14 were flat compared to the previous close.

On a weekly basis, the BIST 100 recorded a 8.95 percent fall. The index hit its all-time high at 121,531.50 points on Jan. 29, while it has fallen by 23.5 percent since the beginning of this year.

The total market value of listed shares on the BIST 100 was around 595 billion Turkish liras ($123.5 billion) at the close, while the BIST banking index ended day down 0.63 percent and holding sector index rose 1.56 percent.

Among all sectors, the BIST mining index fell the most with a 2.27 percent decline, and the investment trusts sector record the top performance with a 3.53 percent hike.

Stocks of conglomerate Tekfen Holding (TKFEN) -- involved in oil, power generation, construction and infrastructure -- ended the day with the best performance, up 6.21 percent, and shares of prominent electronics and appliances manufacturer Arcelik (ARCLK) fell the most with a 5.37 percent down.

On Friday, the USD/TRY exchange declined to 4.8330 as of 5 p.m. local time (1400GMT), down from 4.8500 at Thursday's close.

The euro/lira exchange rate also fell to 5.6310 by market close, compared to 5.6710 at Thursday's close, and one British pound traded for 6.3710 Turkish liras, while the GBP/TRY rate was 6.4170 at the previous close.

As of 6.30 p.m. local time (1600GMT), the price of Brent oil stood at $73.44 per barrel -- hovering between $73.23 and $75.66 on Friday -- while it was around $66 at the beginning of this year.