
Turkish lira plunges 20% - ksahin
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/10/turkish-lira-loss-deepens-as-pm-erdogan-calls-for-citizens-to-convert-.html
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ArtWomb
So, this is what a Black Swan looks like in real-time ;)

I can recall not even five years ago when $USDTRY was historically stable just
below 2.00. It's possible it will go to 8.00 very shortly.

After winning re-election in June, US-Turkey relations became strained over
Erdogan's consolidation of power. Including the appointment of his son-in-law
as Finance Minister. High inflation and deficits should have triggered a raise
in interest rates. Policy experts conjectured a looming threat of sanctions
would compel action.

But instead the Central Bank, under authoritarian control of the popular
regime, wanted to implement its own brand of capital controls. The result is
an historic devaluation. And risk of contagion spreading with highly levered
European bank exposure.

Looking at the raw economic numbers. Turkey's GDB is under $1T annually. And
outstanding foreign denominated debt approx $500B. The scale is minuscule
compared to China and the West. As global debt approaches $50T and rate of
growth slows below the the rate at which interest on that debt accumulates. It
is not out of the realm of possibility that what is happening in Turkey right
now serves as a microcosm for what could happen around the globe. Populist
backed government seizure of private capital on an unprecedented scale.

There is no other way to interpret this than as a cautionary tale of the
necessity of fiscal policy insulation from political winds of change.

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madeuptempacct
From the article:

"The sharp drop in Turkish assets came after a delegation returned from
Washington with no apparent progress on the detention of U.S. pastor Andrew
Brunson, who is charged with supporting a group blamed for an attempted coup
in 2016."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Brunson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Brunson)

"Andrew C. Brunson (born January 3, 1968) is an American pastor in Turkey,
arrested in October 2016 in the purges occurring after the aftermath of the
2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, imprisoning tens of thousands of Turkish
military personnel, civil servants, educators, academics, dissidents, and
journalists.[3][4] Brunson is an evangelical pastor of the Izmir Resurrection
Church, a small Protestant church with about 25 congregants."

First time I am hearing about this guy. P.S. the "coup" seemed pretty staged
even when it was happening. It was pretty incompetent.

The "reason" for these sanctions is also pretty convoluted.

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kyriakos
Is the imprisoned pastor the reason or the excuse for the US sanctions? I have
a feeling US/Turkey have other more important reasons to have issues with
their relationship now like Turkey's sudden friendship with Russia.

