Mustafa İbrahim Turhan took over the office of president of the İstanbul Stock Exchange (İMKB) from Hüseyin Erkan at a ceremony held at İMKB headquarters in İstanbul on Monday.
Turhan, who was formerly one of the four vice governors of the Central Bank of Turkey, announced the new administration’s targets at the ceremony and praised former president Erkan for his high achievements that lacked any moral flaw. (source)
New president Turhan noted that the total value of companies listed on the İMKB is $385.7 billion and doesn’t reflect the real dynamism of the Turkish economy. He said, “Our stock market must raise its market capitalization to TL 1 trillion by the end of 2015.”
Turhan mentioned Turkey ranks 12th among 21 emerging economies, according to the MSCI World Index, which is often used as a common benchmark for global stock funds, and Turkey is widely becoming an internationally recognized stock market since the establishment of the market a quarter of a century ago.
He said the aim of the new administration is to create a more-valuable market which contains a high number of companies open to the public. He said, “The İMKB must be a center of the İstanbul Finance Center (İFC) project, which is the final stage of Turkey’s goal to become one of the core countries in the world.”
Turhan emphasized that the İFC should not be seen as bunch of buildings rising in İstanbul’s Ataşehir neighborhood and said, “Substructures must be created in order to make sure this project provides institutional, technological, legal and economical transformation.” He underlined that the main goal of the new administration will be to take a more effective role in the project.
He said a foreign stock exchange market should be created within this framework, and the stock of international companies located in at least regional countries should be traded in İstanbul by the end of 2015. He added, “The İMKB should increase collaboration with international stock markets and form strategic partnerships.”
Turhan underlined the importance of investments in order to secure the speed of the country’s economy and said, “The key solution to this is stock markets and especially the İMKB.” He talked about the country’s current account deficit (CAD) and said, “In order to reduce the deficit, domestic savings should be encouraged, which can lead people to appraise their savings in stock markets.”
He suggested that real estate-backed financial products and collateralized stocks must gain importance in the İMKB as well as equity securities and bonds.
