Turkish stocks down at open

By Muhammed Ali Gurtas

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey's benchmark stock index started the day down 115.18 points to open at 110,224.81 points on Tuesday.

Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index decreased by 0.10 percent while the banking and holding sector indexes were flat with 0.05 percent fall and 0.03 percent rises, respectively.

Among all sectors, the BIST tourism index was the best performer, up 0.81 percent while the BIST telecommunication index started the day with the biggest drop, going down 0.43 percent.

During trading hours on Monday, the benchmark index hit its highest peak ever -- 110,530.75 points. At close, the BIST 100 went up 584.84 points -- 0.53 percent -- to stand at 110,339,99 points, marking its highest close of all time.

The U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate slightly increased to 3.4540 at 9.30 a.m. local time (0630GMT) Tuesday, compared with 3.4490 at Monday’s close.

Last Friday, the lira hit an eight-month high against the dollar and the U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate fell below 3.45 after market close.