CENTRAL BANK FX SWAP DEPENDENCY FALLS SHARPLY
The central bank’s reliance on foreign exchange swaps has dropped sharply, marking a structural improvement in the quality of the bank’s international reserves.
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MEDIUM-TERM PROGRAM DROPS STRONG LIRA POLICY, FUELS ELECTION TALK
The government revealed its new Medium-Term Program (OVP) covering 2027–2029, outlining macroeconomic targets that analysts view as unusually realistic while hinting at election preparations for 2027.
FX-PROTECTED DEPOSIT SCHEME ENDS
The Foreign Exchange-Protected Deposit scheme, known as KKM, has come to a complete end after total balances in the accounts dropped to zero, according to weekly data from the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency (BDDK).
OVERSEAS CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS DROP SHARPLY
The contracts of construction firms abroad fell by more than half in the first six months of 2026.
TAYT/TIGHTS
The word of the week is tayt, one of those treacherous little linguistic friendships the French call faux amis. It sounds almost like the English tights, though Turkish politely drops the final hiss.
FINAL STEPS UNDERWAY TO DROP US CHARGES AGAINST HALKBANK
Halkbank, the state lender and fourth-largest bank in Turkey by assets, announced that a nine-year-old US criminal case against the bank is getting closer to a complete end. The bank and the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York submitted a joint plea to the court on June 10, 2026, requesting the dismissal of all charges.
STOCKS COLLAPSE FOLLOWING CHP NULLITY DECISION AS BILLIONS OF DOLLARS INJECTED INTO MARKET WITHIN HOURS
Selling pressure intensified on Istanbul’s stock exchange today following a court ruling of "absolute nullity" regarding the main opposition CHP congress. The benchmark BIST 100 index plunged over 6%, triggering a market-wide circuit breaker. The banking index took an even heavier hit, dropping more than 8% to close at 13,163 points.
HIGH-STAKES DIPLOMACY: ERDOĞAN’S WHITE HOUSE VISIT AND ITS STRATEGIC COSTS
There is a way of establishing a working relationship with U.S. President Donald Trump. First you have to make sure you see him as a smart, respectable world leader. That’s the easy part. Then you have to lure him with trade deals, making sure he is the winning side. Therefore, it comes as no surprise when Turkey unilaterally dropped its retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products on Sept. 22, a few days before the scheduled meeting between President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House. Buzzwords are important for Trump, and tariff is one of them. The tariffs, which covered products including passenger cars, fruit, rice, tobacco, alcoholic beverages, solid fuels, and chemical products, were introduced in 2018 in response to U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum imports enacted during Trump's first term in office.
EUROFIGHTERS: A STOPGAP WITH STRINGS
The German government has dropped its veto on the sale of 40 Eurofighter Typhoon jets to Turkey, thanks to the requests of the Turkish opposition, claimed Özgür Özel, the head of the CHP. While Berlin has been dragging its feet on talks for the warplanes, which are built by a consortium of Germany, Britain, Italy, and Spain, a news report suggested in April that the German government had decided to keep blocking the sale due to the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu on March 19. While such a decision was never officially confirmed, İmamoğlu tweeted from his prison cell, objecting to the veto and Özel kept the issue on the agenda during talks with his German counterparts.
TURKEY’S HYDROPOWER OUTPUT PLUNGES 25% AS DAMS RUN DRY
Turkey’s once-mighty dams are losing their power — literally. Electricity generation from the country’s largest hydro plants has fallen by a quarter in the past three decades, a drop experts link to worsening drought and years of poor planning.
CHP CONGRESS CANCELLATION HITS THE STOCK MARKET
Following the cancellation on Sept. 2 of the CHP Istanbul Provincial Congress, losses on the Istanbul Stock Exchange exceeded 5% within the day. The banking index dropped by more than 8% before rebounding.
İŞ BANK SEES 29% INFLATION, 35% INTEREST RATES AT END-2025
Hakan Aran, head of İş Bank, the country’s largest private lender, said they expect Turkey’s annual inflation to drop to 29% by the end of 2025, with interest rates falling to 35%. Aran shared his predictions regarding the economic normalization process at a press conference. According to Aran, “we may see monthly inflation rates drop below 1% as the normalization process begins in May 2026.”