Can Okar

Now coming back to still eye-watering levels of 5.80. A lot of eyes will be on the son-in-law later today.

Woke up, looked at phone, saw that Turkish lira had lost 10%, shouted, now watching it lurch around like a drunken sailor as the markets open. This is now officially a currency crisis.

Turkish politics is so fast-paced that we forget what happened a couple of months ago. Looking at the economy now, let me remind you that the election was pulled forward by over a year. People in power knew this was coming. The Brunson thing exacerbated it but this is systemic.

Turkish lira taking a beating today in what I shall call “pastorization”. Down over 5% in one day, trading at 5.56. That’s nearly 30 kuruş in a few hours.

Turkish lira hitting fresh lows, with USD/TRY touching 5.48, EUR/TRY 6.35 and GBP/TRY 7.05. These one day falls of 3-4% are anathema to the everyone in the economy. It is time to stop the rot now.

Does anyone else reckon Tim should just call Berat and hash this out once and for all.https://twitter.com/tashecon/status/1027512395474915328 …

Dolar 5.44https://twitter.com/tvahaber/status/1027292344134131726 …

Turkish lira breaking negative records. Again. When will someone in power realize that “leaking” positive but ungrounded news about potential remedies only fuels massive blowback once reality becomes clear?

Not just Ryanair. Reyyan and I have nearly missed 3 flights because of this phenomenon.https://twitter.com/greeneggs_/status/1027220002653515776 …

Thank you to @arslanyasinm. “Sen kimsin ya” is an important omission on my part. “”Who do you think you are” doesn’t capture it.

If Turkey’s economic woes hit the mainstream press, we really need to agree on good translations of the following: - Algı operasyonu - Haddini bilsin - Eeeeyyyy - Her kafadan ses çıkmasın - Bunlar terörist (context: where they’re clearly not)

We sometimes forget that currencies and money are an illusion. They are entirely about trust that this arbitrary piece of paper or metal represents value. If you think of Turkish lira in that context, you realize that the government has a massive job to do. Regain trust!

Turkey is being convulsed by a Goldman analyst seeing 7.1 for USD/TRY. I think we should be clear about this: lira has reached a point that is no longer about economic fundamentals. Once trust goes, anything can happen. Sane heads need to rebuild trust.

An incredible joke/tear-jerker from Turkey: “If you want to avoid the reality of what’s happening, just go buy a newspaper.”https://twitter.com/kumsalsiz/status/1026742342504603650 …

Do you know what’s most curious about Turkey’s slow burn economic collapse? Everyone who should be saying something has disappeared. The President, the Finance Minister, the media and the Central Bank. Utter silence. I didn’t know silence could be so mesmerising.

Much of Turkey’s economic and geopolitical woes are self inflicted. But these new Trump vanity sanctions on Iran are plain bad luck. The bad choices of millions of Americans are going to hurt Turkey for no more reason than Trump has to undo every Obama success.

I don’t think it can be stressed enough that Turks meeting or boasting about kinship with Venezuelan leader Maduro is a terrible idea right now. This is something we call optics. It’s surprisingly important.

Turkish lira today has been Bitcoin-esque in its volatility. There was a sudden flash movement a few moments ago that has partially corrected but for a few seconds GBP/TRY was over 7.03. No words left.