ISTANBUL

Turkey's benchmark stock index closed Thursday at 1,551.57 points, down 1.13%.

Starting the day at 1,578.03 points, Borsa Istanbul's BIST 100 index lost 17.78 points over the midweek's close of 1,569.35 points.

During the day, the index's deepest point was 1,551.57 and the highest was 1,582.04 points.

The total market value of the BIST 100 was around 1.17 trillion Turkish liras ($156.9 billion) by market close, with a daily trading volume of 30.38 billion Turkish liras ($4.1 billion).

On the fourth transaction day of the week, 36 stocks on the index rose, 62 fell, and two were unchanged compared to Wednesday.

The highest trading volumes were posted by real estate investment company Emlak GYO, and private lenders Garanti and Akbank.

Conglomerate Verusa Holding was the best performer, with its shares up 9.95%, while stocks of liquefied petroleum gas company Aygaz dropped the most, losing 4.74%.

The price of one ounce of gold was $1,865.35 by market close, up from $1,849 at the previous close, according to data from Borsa Istanbul's Precious Metals and Diamond Markets.

The price of Brent crude oil was around $55.90 per barrel as of 6.15 p.m. local time (1515GMT) on Thursday.