Turkey's Borsa Istanbul goes up in opening session

By Dilara Zengin

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey's benchmark index started on Wednesday with a 351.95-point increase to open at 91,256.44 points.

In its opening transactions on the third business day of the week, the BIST 100 index rose by 0.39 percent.

The banking and holding sector indices went up 0.81 percent and 0.07 percent, respectively.

Among all sectors, the banking sector index was the best performer, while the worst performer was non-metal mineral products index, falling by 0.04 percent.

At Tuesday's closing session, the benchmark index was down 335.96 points, or 0.37 percent, to close at 90,904.49 points, with a total trading volume of 5.2 billion Turkish liras (approximately $1.4 billion).

The U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate decreased to 3.6970 at 9.30 a.m. local time (0630GMT) on Wednesday, compared with 3.7140 at Tuesday's close.

On Wednesday, there will be no major local data announcements, but the markets will continue to focus on this Sunday’s referendum.

Meanwhile, analysts said investors will follow the U.K.'s unemployment rate and the U.S.' budget balance, which are set to be released on Wednesday as well as geopolitical developments, especially in North Korea and Syria.