UPDATE - Turkiye's Borsa Istanbul closes Thursday lower

UPDATES WITH MORE DAILY FIGURES

By Ovunc Kutlu

ANKARA (AA) - Turkiye's benchmark stock index posted losses at Thursday's close, falling 0.2% to 2,038.67 points.

After starting the day at 2,048.35 points, Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index lost 4.18 points from Wednesday's close of 2,042.85 points.

During Thursday's trading, the BIST 100 hovered between 2,029.61 points and 2,054.86 points. While 33 stocks on the index rose, 60 fell, and seven were flat compared to the previous day's close.

Closing the day with a market value of nearly 1.63 trillion Turkish liras ($120 billion), the benchmark index posted a daily trading volume of 27.6 billion Turkish liras ($2 billion).

National flag carrier Turkish Airlines and iron and steel producers Kardemir and Eregli recorded the highest trading volumes during the day.

Stocks of pipe and tube producer Erbosan were the top gainer with a 8% rise, while shares of stocks of software and information technology firm ARD Bilisim suffered the most, dropping 6.41%.

One ounce of gold traded for $1,842.80 by market close, up from $1,832.60 at the previous close, according to data from Borsa Istanbul's Precious Metals and Diamond Markets.

The price of Brent crude oil was around $92.75 per barrel as of 6.17 p.m. local time (1517GMT) on Thursday with a gain of 1.3%.