Turkish stocks down over 2 percent at closing

By Gokhan Ergocun

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey's benchmark stock index closed the day at 107,716.51 points with an 8.9 billion Turkish liras ($2.29 billion) trade volume on Wednesday.

Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index dropped 2.21 percent or 2,431.94 points, while the banking and holding sector indices fell by 2.31 and 0.48 percent, respectively.

Among all sectors, the information technology sector was the top gainer with a 2.35 percent hike and the basic metal index fell 4.62 percent, the biggest drop on the day.

Shares of systems integration provider Netas Telekomunikasyon A.S. (NETAS) performed the best -- rising 5.00 percent -- while private lender ICBC Turkish Bank performed the worst -- dropping 19.97 percent.

Five stocks with the highest trade volume were Turkish defense company Aselsan, national flag carrier Turkish Airlines, state lender Halkbank, iron and steel producer Kardemir Karabuk and private lender Garanti.

The BIST Gold Exchange index rose 0.47 percent, while one kilogram gold traded at 160,750 Turkish liras ($41,435) as of 4.30 p.m. local time (1330GMT).

The U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate climbed to 3.8800 as of 5 p.m. local time (1400GMT) Wednesday, compared with 3.8770 at Tuesday’s close.

The EUR/TRY rate also increased to 4.5930 by market close, compared with 4.5580 liras at Tuesday's close.

As of 6 p.m. local time (1500GMT) Wednesday, the price of Brent oil was $61.52 per barrel, compared with the previous day's close at $62.49.