Turkey’s Borsa Istanbul hits record-high at close

By Gokhan Ergocun

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey's stock exchange reached its highest-ever close on the first working day of 2018, recording 117,524.20 points.

On Tuesday, the BIST 100 rose 1.90 percent or 2,191.19 points, with a total trading value of 8 billion Turkish liras (approximately $2.12 billion), while the banking and holding sectors rose 2.09 and 1.81 percent, respectively.

The mining sector index was the best performer, rising 3.86 percent, and the construction sector index saw the biggest drop, falling 1.44 percent.

Electronics/appliances manufacturer Vestel was the top gainer of the day, rising 16.38 percent, while energy and construction conglomerate Isiklar Enerji Yapi Holding suffered the biggest drop of the day, losing 2.50 percent.

The five most-traded stocks were Vestel, automotive manufacturer Karsan Otomotiv, national flag carrier Turkish Airlines, defense company Aselsan and state lender Halkbank.

At the end of 2017, the BIST 100 closed at 115,333.01 points after 5.6 billion Turkish liras ($1.48 billion) worth of trade. The market rose 48.03 percent or 37,425.81 points over the past year.

The U.S. dollar-lira rate dropped by nearly 1 percent to 3.7590 at 9.30 a.m. local time (0630GMT) on Tuesday, compared with Friday's closing rate of 3.7940.

The euro-lira rate also fell to 4.5320 from Friday's close of 4.5490.

A U.S. dollar traded at 3.5390 liras while one euro was 3.7220 liras at the beginning of the last year.

The price of Brent crude oil rose to $66.56 per barrel as of 5.30 p.m. local time (1445GMT) Tuesday, compared with Friday's close of $66.44. It was around $55 in January.

Turkey recorded the second-highest export volume in the republic’s history with $157.1 billion in 2017, according to provisional data of the Ministry of Customs and Trade on Tuesday.