Turkey's benchmark bond yield fell 22 basis points on Friday as traders saw opportunities to buy after morning losses, while the lira weakened against the dollar as investors worried about eurozone debt problems. The yield on Turkey's benchmark bond maturing in July 2013 closed at 10.49 percent on Friday, down from a previous close of 10.60 percent.
The benchmark yield had earlier risen to 10.71 percent on tight lira liquidity, the weaker lira and concerns about problems in the eurozone but that level encouraged investors to pick up bonds, pushing yields down, analysts said. "The difference between bond yields and the swap rates remained at a convenient level for traders to buy bonds. Given volumes are low on the market, this buying prevented yields from rising further," said a fund manager at a bank in Istanbul.
The 2-year dollar-lira swap rate currently stands at 8 percent, allowing investors to sell dollars and buy bonds for some profit. The lira closed at 1.8160 versus the dollar on the interbank market, slightly weaker compared with Thursday's close of 1.8110. Against a euro-dollar basket the lira was nearly 2.1 percent weaker on a weekly basis at 2.1460.
"The weakening of the lira versus a euro-dollar basket indicates there is a net outflow from the market. This is due to the bad sentiment surrounding external markets as well as some investors selling lira to take long positions on other emerging currencies," said a forex trader at a bank. The Turkish central bank said late on Friday it would track global developments closely and would implement policy measures to maintain sustainability in local markets in the framework of its strategy announced in its interim meeting.
The central bank reiterated it would implement adequate measures to keep medium-term inflation expectations intact. The main Turkish share index closed down 1.12 percent at 54,473.90 points, outperforming the emerging markets index, which was down 1.98 percent.
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