WASHINGTON, Nov 3: Standard and Poor's upgraded Turkey's long-term sovereign credit rating on Friday from B+ to BB-, with the agency noting economic progress thanks to the central bank's "tight monetary stance."
That stance "has enabled Turkish authorities to stabilize the lira, bring down inflation, rebuild reserves, and de-dollarize the financial system," S&P said in a statement. The country also saw its savings gap with the rest of the world narrow, it noted.
Turkey's central bank began to raise interest rates last year in efforts to battle soaring prices, after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan dropped his opposition to orthodox monetary policy that calls for rate hikes to tame inflation.
The bank has since ratcheted up its principal rate from 8.5 percent to 50 percent, between June 2023 and March 2024, to curb inflation. —AFP
