Istanbul mayor Imamoglu is arrested. Turkish lira plunges to record low
ISTANBUL, March 19 (Reuters) - Turkey's lira fell 12.7% and touched a new all-time low of 42 to the dollar on Wednesday, with bonds and stocks also tumbling sharply, after authorities detained President Tayyip Erdogan's main political rival.
The mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu, who was expected to be named as the main opposition's presidential candidate within days, faces charges including corruption and aiding a terrorist group.
The currency traded at 39.3 to the dollar at 0854 GMT, from a close of 36.67 on Tuesday, having recovered somewhat from the record low it hit earlier on Wednesday in what looked set to be its largest absolute daily move on record.
Turkey's international government bonds also came under pressure with longer-dated maturities suffering the sharpest falls. The 2045 maturity slipped 1.5 cents to be bid at 85.13 cents.
"In Turkey this morning, bonds and FX are coming under pressure after a potential presidential candidate, the mayor of Istanbul, was arrested," said Frantisek Taborsky, EMEA FX & fixed income strategist at ING.
"(Turkey's lira) is the most heavily positioned carry-trade in the emerging markets space at the moment in our view, and a sharp move could potentially lead to further outflows. On the other hand, we should see local banks providing some FX support."
Stocks also crashed, reflecting investor worries over rule of law. Borsa Istanbul said trading was halted temporarily after the main BIST 100 index fell 6.87% in early trading and the market-wide circuit breaker was triggered.
The BIST 100 index (.XU100), opens new tab was down 4.97% at 0753 GMT while the banking sub-index (.XBAN), opens new tab declined 7.57% after trading resumed at 0730 GMT.
"A wave of selling was triggered after Imamoglu's diploma was annulled and he was detained. There have been foreign investor inflows in recent days...but political uncertainty currently prevails and concerns about foreign investors leaving the country have increased," Serhat Baskurt, algorithmic operations manager at ALB Yatırım, said.
Baskurt said he expected the decline on the stock exchange to continue over the coming days.
Borsa Istanbul also said that the uptick rule on short sale transactions for the BIST 50 index will be used on Wednesday.
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