The rapid, but recently somewhat curbed, decline in the value of the Turkish lira is also having increasing consequences for consumers and entrepreneurs in the country.

Turkish media report price increases for petrol and diesel as well as long lines of waiting and angry drivers before the price increase on Thursday.

In online trading, some products such as iPhones are no longer available because dealers are holding back products in view of the uncertain situation and rising import prices.

Andreas Mihm

Business correspondent for Austria, East-Central and Southeastern Europe and Turkey based in Vienna.

  • Follow I follow

There is a similar message from the real estate and automotive industries, where sellers withdrew their offers in anticipation of further increases in prices.

On the other hand, car dealers tried to fill their stocks at current prices.

Equity eroded

The situation is also worsening in the case of groceries, whose prices rose at an officially measured rate of 27 percent year-on-year in October.

Some supermarkets allegedly ration the supply of basic foodstuffs, while others report difficulties in getting supplies.

The Turkish milk producers asked the government to raise the wholesale price for milk by 55 percent because, among other things, the cost of animal feed shot up.

Even exporters, whose business should tend to benefit from the drop in prices and whom President Recep Tayyip Erdogan wants to strengthen with his policy of low interest rates, speak out critically.

The President of the Association of Exporters of the Aegean Region in Izmir, Jak Eskinazi, told Cumhuriyet newspaper that currency fluctuations of up to 15 percent a day, as reached on Tuesday, cannot be dealt with.

"The equity of our businesses has eroded."

You don't have to be a prophet to find out that "the banks will soon come to the point where they can no longer give credit."

Government officials who think similarly, but would not get through to Erdogan, reports the Reuters agency, citing sources in the government.

Erdogan was able to show a certain degree of political relief by reconciling himself with the United Arab Emirates (VEA), which had been enemies for years.

The deals reached on Wednesday include a $ 10 billion investment fund that Abi Dhabi's sovereign wealth fund will use to finance investments in Turkey.

The target sectors of the planned direct investments are the energy, petrochemicals, technology, transport, infrastructure, health, financial services, food and agriculture sectors.

In addition, the central banks of the two countries signed a cooperation agreement “to promote cooperation”.

There was speculation on the foreign exchange market that the VEA could grant the Turkish central bank a kind of overdraft via a so-called swap agreement.

Similar agreements are already in place with Qatar, China and South Korea.

Against this background, the rate of the lira stabilized on Thursday above 12 lira per dollar and around 13.60 lira per euro.