TURKEY

TURKEY - Report 17 Mar 2019

Both the US and EU served notice that Turkey must change its ways to continue its membership in the Western alliance. The US threatens new sanctions if S-400s are purchased and aid to Maduro endures. The EU made it clear that Turkey should expect neither visa waivers nor negotiations on a new Cus...

TURKEY - Report 11 Mar 2019

The Turkish GDP contracted by 2.4%, q/q, in Q4, after a 1.6% contraction in Q3 (revised down from 1.1% previously), broadly in line with expectations, which also means that by the widely-accepted popular and technical definition of recession (of two consecutive quarters of sequential decline), th...

TURKEY - Report 10 Mar 2019

Turkey and the US stepped towards the ring once again, with Pentagon issuing a final warning to Ankara that the purchase of S-400s is a sanctionable act. Ankara doesn’t take the threat seriously, hoping that Trump will intervene at the last second. Turkey’s relations with the West has taken a tur...

TURKEY - In Brief 06 Mar 2019

As expected, the CBRT’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) kept the policy rate (one-week repo rate) at 24% (simple) today, which was the last meeting before local elections of March 31st. Recall also that this is the fourth consecutive meeting that the Bank left rates unchanged, since it had raised...

TURKEY - Report 04 Mar 2019

Consumer prices rose by 0.16%, m/m, in February, somewhat lower than the market consensus of some 0.4%-0.5%, with the 12-month CPI inflation hence easing further to 19.7%, from 20.4% in January. The 12-month domestic-PPI inflation continued to drop as well, to 29.6% from 32.9% during this period,...

TURKEY - Report 03 Mar 2019

We were both in London from Tuesday through Friday to participate in a dinner event with some 20 experts/investors, which was hosted by TD Securities, organized jointly with Global Source Partners. During this time, we also got to visit several buy and sell-side financial firms touring separately...

TURKEY - Report 24 Feb 2019

The Politics Section begins with a brief exposition to introduce the rival camps in Turkey at the eve of March 31st local elections, which boils down to AKP-MHP versus CHP-IYIP, the latter with tacit support of pro-Kurdish HDP in non-Kurdish majority provinces. Poll data, more scarce compared to ...

TURKEY - Report 17 Feb 2019

As economic data published in January-February reveal an economy mired in recession, and the few polls available to public suggest AKP-MHP failing to gain ground, the administration may be switching to Plan B in electoral populism, namely fiscal and monetary expansionism. Unconventional methods o...

TURKEY - Report 10 Feb 2019

A recent AREA poll confirms our assertion that the AKP-MHP alliance is slipping in nation-wide standings, while city-by-city polls by several agencies reveal it could lose three key races to the opposition. The primary reason behind voter discontent appears to be poor economic management, which P...