TR Economy & Updates

[Lool]

Turkey's trade-deficit with USA peaked in 2011 with a staggering deficit of 9.4 billion $.
2021 (first 9 months) Turkey is recording trade-surplus of 3.7 billion $.
It's probably the best data ever in US-Turkish trade relationship.

International Trade

www.census.gov

The US clearly stated that they dont like having a trade deficit with Turkey and that it should be resolved. Honestly, I expect more embargoes on Turkish products for whatever reason they give before the Americans start to get dependent on them (just like with China) due to high inflation etc....
The US doesnt want a new China
Rn Turkey with embargoes and is still growing. Just imagine if Turkey never had embargoes!? Lool

 

[Fairon]

In Germany there are jobs where you earn ridiculous amount of salary.
But, there's not much of these jobs and competition is vast.
In my big company there are people earning 10.000 to 30.000 € every month, but they're the minority distorting per person GDP statistics.
Most of people living in Germany will earn 1.700 - 2.000 € in a factory.
Working at Amazon in a non-manager role in Germany will get you exactly 1.700-2.000 €.
Anything more you've to do night-shifts or working Sundays and holidays.

With 1.700 - 2.000 € you can only live a happy life if you have a small apartment (1 room, 35 m²), no car, or if you're willing to pay for a car you'll drive some rust bucket.

A 3 room apartment in my city costs over 1.000 € every month, that's already more than half than what average-Hans earns as salary.
If I wanht to drive the bus I have to pay 27 Lira (one way), I can get beef meat for 100 Lira per KG, but I wouldn't even feed that meat to my dog ! Most Germans will eat chicken instead ! Or Döner-Yufka for 50-60 Lira, which they can afford max. 2-3 times a week.
Don't let me get started with prices for petrol-fuel , heating in apartment, electricity or beef and fish which seems to hyper-inflate every 2nd nonth.

You need to have Bachelor / Master and even if you have that qualification you still need to have luck or you're low-wage slave in Germany. It's no paradise in Germany, although German State is top-dog heavyweight in EU.
Believe me !

Why are you using lira for your expenses but not for the income? Isn't that bit dishonest?

 

[Lool]

Strong TL is the worst thing that can happen to Turkey's economy. It would make us permanently trenched in the middle income trap. Let's be honest. We can't expect to live in the standards northern Europeans live. Siemens was founded in 1847. Do you know what companies we had in those times? Bursa Iskender. Yeah, and that's 20 years later. Boeing was building planes in World War 1. You see how far ahead those countries were? And they're constantly innovating ever since. So how do you expect us to catch up with those guys if we had a strong lira? By punishing domestic industry? Wake up. We have to run faster than them. Weak lira makes imports(especially high tech) expensive and makes local projects attractive. You can't do much with $100 million dollars in the US but that money can do wonders here. Make the lira strong and you'll see the companies immediately stop investing in the national peojects and buy the foreign products to use as their subsystems. Why take the risk of failure of developing a product when you can buy it cheap from outside? Companies don't think broad. They're after money and the risk assesment will dictate that you buy the cheap foreign product. Do that for long enough and you're country will just be a consumer market with huge trade deficit. Then they'll put a yoke on your neck and dictate the terms. Why? Because you're so dependent on dollar, they can start control you by controlling the dollar flow in and out of your country. You just loaded the gun handed to the enemy.

So, for a growing population, for a growing economy strong lira is bad. Think of it like a pre-revenue company. What you want the most is not the immediate revenue but growth. Because we have the potential. The western countries don't. That's why they're trying to maximize the profit. It's a different game we're playing.

Of course, non of these justifies the non-sensicle decisions Erdogan has been making. He put the economy in an incredibly vulnerable position. It should've been done in a trustable and foreseeable way.

I agree with your thoughts tbh
The lira should get weaker to attract investments, reduce reliability on imports and increase dependency on national companies

However, such an act, should be done in stages over the span of 5 to 6 years and not in god damn 2 months. IMO, this was Erdo's mistake! He cant just slap the ppl with all this shit at once

 

[Turko]

Özgür Demirtaş - Vikipedi

tr.wikipedia.org

"Is it a success for half of a country to work for minimum wage?

Is it a success that one-third of a country's youth is unemployed?

Is it a success to invest the resources of a country in a single sector?

Is it a success that no university of a country can enter the top 100 in the world?..

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1456857944847536128

 

[Anastasius]

The lira should get weaker to attract investments, reduce reliability on imports and increase dependency on national companies

I would like to point out that if the only way you can get Turkish companies to invest in domestic stuff and reduce reliability on imports is to crash the economy so hard that everything becomes dirt-cheap, you are missing the problem - which is that domestic production is not of a sufficiently high quality to compete in an international arena without devaluing the currency.

As I mentioned before, it's very likely that in such a situation, as soon as you stop artificially keeping the currency down because you think exports are high enough, said export levels will quickly drop again and you are back where you started. And the citizens suffered for nothing.

Again, the obsession with "independence" is a failing endeavor. No economy is truly independent.

However, such an act, should be done in stages over the span of 5 to 6 years and not in god damn 2 months. IMO, this was Erdo's mistake! He cant just slap the ppl with all this shit at once

He had to do it in the span of a few months. The main reason exports are seemingly rising are because COVID-19 screwed all of the supply chains. You do it over the course of 5-6 years, the COVID-19 advantage is long gone by that point. Which, again, is why this strategy is so ridiculous.

Do you know what companies we had in those times? Bursa Iskender. Yeah, and that's 20 years later. Boeing was building planes in World War 1. You see how far ahead those countries were? And they're constantly innovating ever since.

Japan before the Meiji Restoration was basically a feudal state. Boeing built some training planes for the US military, which were old hat by that point, they did not build any actual combat aircraft

 

[TheInsider]

Lira shouldn't lose value from this point on. Maximum gains from devaluing local currency are already achieved there is no further use of devaluing TL more but it seems like TL will continue to fall. 10 will be achieved by the end of this year and somewhere between 12-13 might be achieved next year. There will be a monetary expansion next year and I guess it will be really bad for inflation and the TL/Dollar ratio. The amount of damage will depend on how the budget and trade deficits play out next year.

 

[Lool]

W

Lira shouldn't lose value from this point on. Maximum gains from devaluing local currency are already achieved there is no further use of devaluing TL more but it seems like TL will continue to fall. 10 will be achieved by the end of this year and somewhere between 12-13 might be achieved next year. There will be a monetary expansion next year and I guess it will be really bad for inflation and the TL/Dollar ratio. The amount of damage will depend on how the budget and trade deficits play out next year.

Why will the TL fall further if maximum gains have already been achieved? I mean the reserves exist for a reason dont they? And with such low trade deficits, surely the govt can have enough money to sustain the lira even if it is in swaps
Turkey has around 85 billion (swaps added) which is comparable to the reserve level in 2018 i believe

 

[TheInsider]

I expect lira to slide down further because of lowering interest rates further and monetary expansion policy.

 

[Saithan]

The CB is not independent and RTE is unreliable, and has shown several times that he doesn't care about investors. So why would they bother investing ? He's selling everything valuable to Qatar one way or another.

Turkish Economy lacks trust, and with RTE at the rudder no western country is going to invest big.

 

[Fighter_35]

thos supportimg weak lira are just idiots nothing more, sorry I dont have any respect for your rubbish comments!! none of you live here is also one point to discuss!! you should not even not allowed to use turkish flag and type here!! giving some data does not provide your point morons!! we are not china or a huge population, 500 million-1 billion population , country. we should improve our quality and production technics to be competitive , we can not be china you idiots!! we discusssed it many times here!! even china money does not lose value this much , you idiot morons!!
so why did we overthrow dsp , ecevit?? if losing tl value is a good thing??
you are faceless !! you do not deserve to be called Turk!!

 

[TheInsider]

Lira shouldn't be stronger than 5 and shouldn't be weaker than 7. 10 is very bad 12-13 15 is terrible.

 

[Cypro]

You guys and overall average Turkish businessman always misunderstand the concept of competitive advantage, weak currency and devaluation. $1 has been valued around 100 Japanese Yen for decades, $1 has been valued around 6.5 Chinese Yuan for a long time.

Ignorant economic masterminds think when money loses value, your competitive advantage increases and your exports boom. In reality after some time, minimum wage increases, inflation boom, lost of trust to economy drives people to other currencies and you won't grow in reality only rich get richer, poor get poorer!!

China is a good example for cheap labour and top exporter. $1 = 6.8 yuan in 2008, $1 = 6.46 yuan in 2021.. STABILITY is the only advantage you need for growing and exporting.

If you are not expert like the incompetents that are managing Turkey's economy right now, stop claiming weak lira is a miracle.

In fact Turkey is not growing but shrinking as people get poorer.. Check GDP in USD for last 10 years, then decide if it is growing or not. And exports are another matter, it is just recovering after pandemic, long term metrics are needed for that. Compare today's exports with 2019 or last 5 years not just last year.Some people put two numbers side by side and comment like they are experts. In economics you have short term, long term trends and for coming to a conclusion you need to make both.

Last year was a disaster so comparing anything to 2020 is irrelevant. World economy is just recovering but because of 1 guys wrong beliefs, Turkey is getting poorer everyday. Economy needs stability and trust. People are literally paying the price of corruption and incompetence by getting poorer in 21st century.

 

[TheInsider]

Compare today exports with 2019 or last 5 years not last year.

Turkey exported 180 billion $ worth of goods and services in 2019, 168 billion in 2018, 169.5 in 2020(pandemic)
This year TR will export around 220 billion. 180 to 220 is a big jump. Show me another country that increased its exports by over %20.

 

[Fighter_35]

Turkey exported 180 billion $ worth of goods and services in 2019, 168 billion in 2018, 169.5 in 2020(pandemic)
This year TR will export around 220 billion. 180 to 220 is a big jump. Show me another country that increased its exports by over %20.

So you increased your export from 180 to 220 let's say. What about the export value per 1 kg product?? I mean if you exported 180 kg for 180 billion usd, you exported more than 22o kg of same products!! I bet it decreased so much instead of increase!! You try to produce high tech products but we are trying to be competitive in terms of cost by decreasing production cost!! You arenot adding anything to country if you can not increase your quality and technological products percentage in that export numbers!!
So in order to increase our export numbers by 20-25 percent, we are losing more in every field other than export by decreasing our currency!!

 

[Fighter_35]

In order to increase your export , you need to increase your quality and you should create global brands!! If you can not do this, there is no reason for any one to be responsible from our economy and from our gowernment. Everyone can manage better than this!!
Main issue is improving life standarts by improving our quality, our production, our exports, everyone can increase export by devalueing currency and making people poorer!!

 

[Sinan]

Germany (€), Japan (Yen), Switzerland (CHF) etc. invest huge sums into R&D, there's innovation around every corner be it in top-class universities or world-leading companies.
These are fully industrialized countries not for 2-3 years but for decades ! Just imagine how much money is in their innovation cycle each years ongoing for decades.
What these countries produce will always be in demand on world-market until someone shows up who can gain market-shares from them at their expense.
Just like Turkey is now doing in high-tech weapon sales.
Let's see where automobile industry is going with e-vehicles and new heavyweights like Tesla, Chinese brands etc. and see whether Volkswagen will be able to pay same wages in their German or EU-outsourced factories in 10 years time !
When Tesla first showed-up German media was laughing at Tesla, now they're shitting their pants from the arised competition.

For now German economic model is sustainable.
But their is no godly law declaring that German, Swiss economy will be successful forever as other nations including Turkey push into high-tech sector.

Medium and high-tech exports (% manufactured exports) - Turkiye, Germany, Japan, Switzerland | Data

Medium and high-tech exports (% manufactured exports) - Turkiye, Germany, Japan, Switzerland from The World Bank: Data

data.worldbank.org

Turkey is not at the development level of Germany or Switzerland.
EU-Turkey customs union started 1995 and EU is Turkey's biggest trading partner.
Turkey ran trade-deficits with EU continously.
How sustainable is that model I ask you ?
In 2019 with weakening TL Turkey has achieved a small trade surplus with EU.
Unlike EU the population in Turkey is growing 1 million each year, Turkey has to create jobs.
How you'll be creating jobs when you import more than you export ?

You want strong TL at this stage of Turkey's development you agree with Turkey running chronic deficits, Turkey becoming more dependant on outside than getting more self-sufficient.

Turkey-EU - international trade in goods statistics - Statistics Explained

EU statistics provide an analysis of the international trade in goods between the EU and Turkey, by member state and by type of goods exchanged.

ec.europa.eu

And when you say "Lira is only 1/10th worth of 20 years ago" then you have to remember that Turkey is a much different country than 20 years ago.
Turkey exported 28 billion $ worth of goods in 2000.
Textiles being the biggest export items, and Anatolia being mainly an agricultural country with electricity outages and more 3rd-world vibes the more east you go into Anatolia. Same with literacy rates !

https://oec.world/en/profile/country/tur?yearSelector1=exportGrowthYear6

So, my question to you is simple:
How are you going to lift Turkey to the next level with strong TL given Turkey is fully integrated into world-markets and Turkey has developed so many new trade relationships ?
You can't sell machinery to Africa where Africans say to themselves "Hell, I can pay the extra 15% and get the proven German or Italian machine ! " and on the way bankrupt yourself because you're running chronic deficits with strong TL in any statistical category.

I really wanna beat up people who talks "strong TL this, weak TL that"...

We can't keep up with the inflation here....

 

[Sinan]

thos supportimg weak lira are just idiots nothing more

Living at abroad and supporting weak lira, so that they can buy more with their euros when they came to Turkey.

 

[Xenon54]

View attachment 35241

I really wanna beat up people who talks "strong TL this, weak TL that"...

We can't keep up with the inflation here....

Insane. Here is the price in Switzerland, minimum wage is 3500 Chf (only very few people work minimum wage here), a person living on minimum wage in Switzerland can buy like 15 times more sunflower oil compared to a minimum wage in Turkey.
And thats just freaking sunflower oil, dont even wanna talk about electronics at this point...

 

[Nilgiri]

Kind of beating a dead horse or two here on this thread....ppl either get it or they dont at this point.

Exports is half the picture of the current account.

Current account is half the picture of the Balance of Payments.

The BoP is only some portion of the economy.

Half of a half of a portion.....what % relevance its going to be in best case scenario?

There is basic reason increase in exports has caused large increase in imports too (i.e how much net value added actually goes on in Turkey)

CA deficit is relatively unchanged...and has marginal affect on the bludgeoning Turkey economy is taking from inflation at large....made worse by decreasing interest rate ...that too without fixing the structural issue.

Changing a dial setting to slightly benefit 10% of economy (at best) to huge detrimental cost of 90% is madness.

Investment is the only thing that helps to transmit an equitable lever.....and is precisely the thing turkey has largely missed out on (commensurate to its development and consumption levels) in the preceding decade.

Just search my posts in this thread...some people are still talking about exports as be all end all...when it is just one part of much bigger thing (in both time and space).

 

[Cypro]

Turkey exported 180 billion $ worth of goods and services in 2019, 168 billion in 2018, 169.5 in 2020(pandemic)
This year TR will export around 220 billion. 180 to 220 is a big jump. Show me another country that increased its exports by over %20.

At the end of the year if that will be achieved, then congratulations to everyone but it is not because of weak lira (which have temporary effect). Nobody can deny facts, trend is upward and that would be a big leap. However it is a known fact that after big crises, economy booms temporarily, I am just saying it should be analysed long term, short term, exports going up does not mean economy is good. Economy does not like steep changes, growth should be sustainable.

Exports growing with imports together is not what we want, trade surplus is the goal. Turkey still has big current account deficit despite weak lira, inflation etc. which is not good.