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Turkey's Financial Crisis

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Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#11

Post by forvelin »

hereforphone wrote: post #2

Erdoğan claims that lowering interest rates to zero or near zero is more in line with Islamic principles, which may be true (according to interpretation of Islamic principles, I assume). This is a bold move that reinforces what was already suspected: he is continuing to solidify his power by appealing to Islamic sympathies. During the recent coup calls to resist the belligerents were broadcast over mosque loudspeaker…

It has nothing to do with religious beliefs, its all about gathering capital on his side. He is just abusing peoples' religious beliefs. Everybody knows the new savings scheme he introduced is essentially increasing interest rates.

Contrary to popular belief, I do not think that Erdogan will continue to mold Turkey's future. So far Turkey always had 40-50% opposition which could not unit, but now they are all united and next time it is certainly going to tip the scale in the right way. He will do everything to delay the elections or call them at the right time -like now ?- but his plans don't always work out -not far, look to recent Istanbul elections he lost.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#12

Post by nickff »

DSingularity wrote: post #9
hereforphone wrote: post #2

Erdoğan claims that lowering interest rates to zero or near zero is more in line with Islamic principles, which may be true (according to interpretation of Islamic principles, I assume). This is a bold move that reinforces what was already suspected: he is continuing to solidify his power by appealing to Islamic sympathies. During the recent coup calls to resist the belligerents were broadcast over mosque loudspeaker…

Throats were slit? I never read that. If you believe in democracy you would celebrate the failure of a coup. Even if you hate the surviving leader, you ought to prefer defeating him within the frameworks of democracy. You seem to really dislike Muslim culture. If the people of Turkey want their culture to closer to that of Syria instead of Germany, what’s the problem?

>"If you believe in democracy you would celebrate the failure of a coup. Even if you hate the surviving leader, you ought to prefer defeating him within the frameworks of democracy."

You are supposing that the once freely-elected leader will permit a reversion to 'free' democracy. In fact, rigged elections form the basis of stable autocracies. Outright juntas and dictatorships are actually more likely to transition to 'free' democracies.[1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Logic_of_Political_Surviva...

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#13

Post by lumost »

DSingularity wrote: post #4

> The one thing that the central bank is not doing is raising interest rates. This is at the heart of the entire crisis. Okay am I missing something here? Europe has negative rates. The US has negative rates. But when Turkey lowers rates from 19% (!!?!!) to 14% it creates a “crisis”?

there is a "natural" interest rate which is roughly what a lender would expect to earn when lending to a reputable borrower. The Federal Reserve/ECB may lend at a slightly lower/higher rate than this natural rate - but going far away from it leads to a crisis as the money supply becomes distorted.

There is a big difference between lending at 0% when "natural" interest is .25% and lending at 14% when natural interest is 20%. If inflation is 18% you're effectively giving consumers 4% return on borrowed money, which means everyone will borrow as much money as they possibly can and use it to purchase goods.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#14

Post by forvelin »

1cvmask wrote: post #5

I looked up the core values of Turkey. And their debt to gdp ratio is 40%. Neighboring Greece is 200%. The Turkish economy was the second fastest growing economy last year in the G20 and is on pace to be the one of the fastest growing economies this year. Turkey has had record exports and been one of the most successful in tourism both last year and this year helping the current account deficit. Yet bankrupt Greece c…

is this unexpected ? erdogan literally buys weapons from russia as a nato member, allies with putin at every occassion and disregards any civilized values. he'd like to squeeze minorities as he wants, oppress the opposition as he wants and ally with whoever he wants. at that point, people might not want to cooperate with you, a bit of diplomacy eh ?

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#15

Post by grenoire »

DSingularity wrote: post #9
hereforphone wrote: post #2

Erdoğan claims that lowering interest rates to zero or near zero is more in line with Islamic principles, which may be true (according to interpretation of Islamic principles, I assume). This is a bold move that reinforces what was already suspected: he is continuing to solidify his power by appealing to Islamic sympathies. During the recent coup calls to resist the belligerents were broadcast over mosque loudspeaker…

Throats were slit? I never read that. If you believe in democracy you would celebrate the failure of a coup. Even if you hate the surviving leader, you ought to prefer defeating him within the frameworks of democracy. You seem to really dislike Muslim culture. If the people of Turkey want their culture to closer to that of Syria instead of Germany, what’s the problem?

The problem is that people suffer the transition's consequences.

The current state of affairs has driven a rather large part of the country's population, who share Western ideals and want to pursue them for their nation, prefer a coup over whatever this ongoing messy loss of wealth and human capital is (certainly not 'democracy,' though). That should be telling, but it's hard to have Westerners empathise, I guess?

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#16

Post by 1cvmask »

forvelin wrote: post #11
hereforphone wrote: post #2

Erdoğan claims that lowering interest rates to zero or near zero is more in line with Islamic principles, which may be true (according to interpretation of Islamic principles, I assume). This is a bold move that reinforces what was already suspected: he is continuing to solidify his power by appealing to Islamic sympathies. During the recent coup calls to resist the belligerents were broadcast over mosque loudspeaker…

It has nothing to do with religious beliefs, its all about gathering capital on his side. He is just abusing peoples' religious beliefs. Everybody knows the new savings scheme he introduced is essentially increasing interest rates. Contrary to popular belief, I do not think that Erdogan will continue to mold Turkey's future. So far Turkey always had 40-50% opposition which could not unit, but now they are all united…

He lost all three of the biggest cities of Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir. Yet his coalition actually increased their total votes in the municipal elections by getting more votes in other cities.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#17

Post by 1cvmask »

hereforphone wrote: post #8
beebeepka wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh. I wasn't aware religious beliefs include monetary policies. I just hope they don't start another war out of desperation.

One big concern is that Erdoğan will likely hold on to power however he can. He's already circumvented the constitution (and changed electoral law). I believe he will fight to maintain his reign if necessary. He has about 50% of the country behind him, and as far as I can tell the allegiance is based on religious principles, which makes it a strong allegiance indeed.

Donald Trump only won 46.1% of the vote in 2016 and that was enough. In fact no one got over 50%. Hillary Clinton had a plurality with 48.2%

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_United_States_presidentia...

In England David Cameron had a parliamentary majority with only 38% of the vote.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#18

Post by smnrchrds »

hereforphone wrote: post #2

Erdoğan claims that lowering interest rates to zero or near zero is more in line with Islamic principles, which may be true (according to interpretation of Islamic principles, I assume). This is a bold move that reinforces what was already suspected: he is continuing to solidify his power by appealing to Islamic sympathies. During the recent coup calls to resist the belligerents were broadcast over mosque loudspeaker…

> Islam was acceptable (as Turkey was attempting to be a "free" republic), but not compulsory.

Until Erdogan overturned it, there was a ban on women wearing hijab (the head covering , that the vast majority of Muslims consider a basic tenet of their religion) in universities in Turkey. I leave the judgment to you, but personally I wouldn't consider asking millions of people to choose between adhering to their religion and getting a higher education to be treating their religion as "acceptable, just not compulsary".

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-11880622

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#19

Post by TimVulcanus »

baxtr wrote: post #6

Just a question: would it have been a good idea for a Turkish person, say, a year ago, to invest in stable coins to prevent suffering from Lira depreciation? PS: This is a sincere question… EDIT: some are asking why not real Euros or Dollars? I was thinking convenience and availability. I’m not sure if you could just easily get dollars in Turkey.

Well you could if you are talking about usd stablecoin, but you could have also simply buy another currency be it euro, US dollar... as long as its value compared to the turkish lira was greater.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#20

Post by theNJR »

baxtr wrote: post #6

Just a question: would it have been a good idea for a Turkish person, say, a year ago, to invest in stable coins to prevent suffering from Lira depreciation? PS: This is a sincere question… EDIT: some are asking why not real Euros or Dollars? I was thinking convenience and availability. I’m not sure if you could just easily get dollars in Turkey.

Turkey banned crypto https://fortune.com/2021/04/30/turkey-crypto-ban-erdogan-cry...
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