Turkey's Borsa Istanbul goes down at close

By Muhammed Ali Gurtas

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey’s benchmark index fell 600.82 points to close at 97,712.94 points on Thursday.

Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index was down by 0.61 percent with a total trading volume of 6.7 billion Turkish liras (approximately $1.88 billion), after recording its highest close of all times with 98,313.77 points on Wednesday.

On the fourth day of the week, the banking and holding sector indices decreased by 0.27 and 3.09 percent, respectively.

Among all sectors, the electricity index was the top gainer -- up 2.43 percent -- while the holding sector saw the biggest decline.

Shares of Koza Gold Corp. (KOZAA), operating in the mining sector, were the top performer with an increase of 6.45 percent in value while stocks of one of the prominent Turkish conglomerates Koc Holding (KCHOL) declined the most -- down 6.52 percent.

The five most-traded stocks were Koc Holding, national flag carrier Turkish Airlines, telecommunication giant Turkcell, followed by private lenders Garanti and Akbank.

The U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate stood flat at 3.5650 as of 5 p.m. (1400GMT) on Thursday, compared with 3.5640 at Wednesday's close.

Borsa Istanbul's Gold Exchange index advanced 0.19 percent while the price of gold per kilogram was 143,950 Turkish liras (some $40,391) as of 4.30 p.m. (1330GMT).