Live data from Hacker News

Turkey's Financial Crisis

adamtooze.substack.com

91–100 of 207 posts

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 religio…

Quoted post unavailable.

And the solution to that imaginary problem is.. to ban all women from wearing hijab? Excellent logic.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#92
Erdogan pulled a huge pump and dump scheme a few days ago. He kept repeating everything that makes the Turkish Lira weaker and weaker, he and his government claimed that the plan is to lower the lira and compete on price and the lira is not weak because they failed but because that's the plan. We will be the next China, they said.

Then on the night of Dec 20, he introduces a financial instrument where the government offers %14 interest and guarantees to pay the any difference if it happens that the lira devalues. With a coordinated effort, government banks start selling $USD the whole day and whole night when the markets are shallow and Turks are asleep, selling off at least 7B$ of the reserves of the central bank and who knows how much of other banks, lowering the $USD from 18 the night Turks went to bed to 11 at the morning.

Look at that graph: https://twitter.com/tashecon/status/1473065067914702852

Then they continued to sell off the national $USD reserves, conducting a full blown media propaganda operation including advertisement that is obviously produced at least days before the event. Looking back, just the day before the stock market crashed with %10 and there are rumours of certain businessman being informed that the government will change it's stance and intervene strongly.

Then we had the Economy minister bragging how they screwed up the little guy who bought $USD at over 14 in an attempt to protect their savings, adding that no institutional investors were harmed in the process.

It's just a crypto-bros level of shake off organised and executed by the government. They claim that the orthodox economists are to be blamed for the losses, how silly they are for not accounting for the government tricking the people. Imagine FED giving guidance for interest rates decrease then out of the blue dramatically increasing the rates at midnight once the pals of the president position themselves correctly and saying that the public shouldn't have listed to the economists.

At this very moment, Erdogan is having an "interview" that is broadcasted by multiple TV channels and as expected they again started selling off $USD as he began speaking, pushing the dollar from about 12 to 10.

Take a look at that chart: https://imgur.com/a/CxYYfyL

That's %20 daily volatility.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#93

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 religio…

Yep. A lot of people seem to - willingly or unwillingly - ignore the dark side of Ataturk’s revolution. The fact of the matter is that nothing in the real world is ever as rosy as you would like it to be.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#94
post #88
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…

Any source on that claim that Obama was behind the coup attempt in 2016?

There are never any sources on these things until 20 years after the fact. So we really don't know. But if you'd gone ahead and assumed America had a hand in every coup in the Western world over the past century, you'd at least have a pretty good batting average.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#95

> 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”?

Until last year, US and Europe was desperately trying to raise inflation. I do not remember any time in Turkish history when this was the case. Anyways, current Turkish PPI is >50% (and it will only increase in coming months.). The real interest rate in Turkey is in far negative territory compared to US and EU, where they are desperate for inflation.

>> US ... was desperately trying to raise inflation.

Well good news, they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams....

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#96
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…

You are 100% true. But erdogan did buy russian weapons after the us forbade him to buy american ones. Turkey disobeid the american golem and must pay the price

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well you conveniently skipped another very important country in the region.

For those of us interested but less informed - could you name the country directly?

It's a different axis. The Turks are fighting the Sauds for influence in the Islamic world, while the Sauds are fighting the Iranians in their imagined Shia vs Sunni conflict.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#98
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.

> Yust 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…

No.

PS: This is a sincere answer.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 religio…

Quoted post unavailable.

lol this is so patently false. in a family very close to me, the husband would very much like his wife to wear not hijab and his wife tells him to mind his own business. both are muslim.

Re: Turkey's Financial Crisis

#100

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 religio…

I would feel extremely comfortable banning those head coverings from all universities, if not all public venues. Religious vestment simply has no place outside of ritual occasions. But then again, I'm from the country Atatürk took after. From our point of view, allowing religion to exist is treating it with tolerance. Acknowledging religion as something that deserves any sort of deference by the State isn't acceptable. And I say that as an otherwise religious person myself (don't take it as the stance of some rabid atheist).
Post reply on HN