Turkey's central bank keeps policy rate unchanged

Turkey's central bank on Thursday kept its one-week repo rate -- also known as the policy rate -- steady at 14%, in line with market forecasts, Report informs, citing the country's Central Bank.

At its last meeting on December 16, the central bank cut its benchmark one-week repo rate by 100 basis points from 15% to 14% in line with market expectations, meaning that since September 2021 the key rate had been lowered by 500 basis points.

Last year, after several consecutive cuts in the discount rate by the central bank, the depreciation of the national currency accelerated sharply, which negatively affected the country's financial system. Thus, the 18% collapse of the Turkish lira on November 23 was the highest in the last 20 years. The dollar exchange rate reached a record 18.4 liras on December 20, while in January last year it was worth 7.4 liras. Several experts expressed fear that such a situation could cause a sharp jump in unemployment.