Turkish stocks down at close

By Tuba Sahin

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey’s benchmark index closed the day with a 239.87-point decrease to reach 94,282.48 points Thursday.

Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index slipped 0.25 percent with a total trading volume of 4.6 billion Turkish liras (over $1.29 billion).

The U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate decreased to 3.5630 liras as of 5 p.m. (1400GMT) Thursday, compared with 3.5800 liras at Wednesday's close.

Borsa Istanbul's Gold Exchange index rose by 0.71 percent while the price of gold per kilogram also fell to 144,700 Turkish liras (around $40,655) as of 4.30 p.m. (1330GMT), down from 145,600 Turkish liras (some $40,762) at Wednesday's close.

On the fourth transaction day of the week, the banking sector index dropped by 1.26 percent while the holding sector advanced by 0.22 percent.

Among all sectors, the insurance index was the best performer with an increase of 2.24 percent while the sports sector was the worst, falling 1.81 percent.

Stocks of EIS Eczacibasi Ilac (ECILC), a pharmaceutical company. operates under a major conglomerate Eczacibasi Group, were the best performer on Thursday -- up 5.38 percent.

Tumosan Motor (TMSN), a major diesel engine and tractor manufacturer,, saw the biggest drop of the day, declining by 4.56 percent.

The five most traded stocks were lenders Garanti, national flag-carrier Turkish Airlines, steelmaker Eregli, followed by another lenders Halkbank and Akbank.