Turkey's Borsa Istanbul starts day over 117,000 points

By Aysu Bicer

ANKARA (AA) – Turkey's benchmark stock index started Wednesday at 117,168.08 points, up 0.55%, or 643.30 points.

At Tuesday's close, Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index was up 59% at 116,524.78 points with a daily trading volume of 23.3 billion Turkish liras ($3.4 billion).

The US dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate dropped slightly to 6.8550 as of 9.30 a.m. local time (0630GMT) Wednesday, compared to 6.8560 at the previous close.

The euro/Turkish lira exchange rate rose to 7.6970 from 7.6880 and one British pound traded for 8.5050 Turkish liras, up from 8.4750 at the Tuesday's close.

One barrel of Brent crude oil sold for around $41.80 as of 10 a.m. local time (0700GMT) on Wednesday.