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Why the lira went into freefall
[ARABNEWS] The Ottoman Turkish lira has lost more than 45 percent against the dollar since the beginning of the year. Initially the reasons were manifold and interlinked: A sizeable current account deficit, the government’s undue influence over the central bank, its opposition to hiking interest rates, high inflation, geopolitical tensions and other factors.

Markets were skeptical when President Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First
... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey...
last month appointed his son-in-law Berat Albayrak as finance minister, replacing the seasoned ex-banker Mehmet Simsek. There were some wobbles but things steadied, before all hell broke loose and the lira went into freefall.

This was exacerbated by mounting tensions between the US and The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
. President Donald Trump
...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States...
doubled tariffs on steel and aluminum and imposed sanctions on some government members after Erdogan refused to release detained US evangelical priest Andrew Brunson. Things did not even calm down after a news conference by Albayrak, where he put forward a plan to combat the country’s economic woes. The lira continued its downward slide.

This all helped boost Turkey’s already high inflation rate. The country’s economy depends on importing energy and essential goods; the impact of the lira slide has also been felt in Turkey’s corporate sector, where companies have widely borrowed in foreign currency.

Over the weekend we saw signs of contagion. The Russian ruble, the Indonesian rupiah and the South African rand depreciated heavily. The euro lost against the yen, which makes sense because Spanish, French and Italian banks are exposed to Turkey. The Ottoman Turkish crisis will not be Greece 2.0 as far as the euro zone is concerned. However,
those who apply themselves too closely to little things often become incapable of great things...
banks BBVA, UniCredit and BNP Paribas all have exposure to Turkey.


Posted by: Fred 2018-08-14
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=520664