Turkey’s lira weakened some 0.5 percent against the dollar on Wednesday to its lowest level since the height of the 2018 currency crisis, as investors eyed the economic impact of the spread of COVID-19 in Turkey, Reuters reported.
The lira stood at 6.8580 against the dollar 0834 GMT, its lowest since August 2018, weakening from a close of 6.8200 on Monday.
At the peak of the currency crisis, the lira crashed to 7.28 at its lowest against the US dollar.
Turkey’s confirmed cases of COVID-19, caused by the novel coronavirus, increased by 4,062 on Tuesday, reaching 65,111 in total, according to a chart posted on Twitter by Health Minister Fahrettin Koca.
Recent moves by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s administration have spooked investors — Turkey on Monday restricted foreigners’ ability to trade the lira in the offshore swaps market, sending the currency falling the furthest among emerging markets for the day, according to the CNBC news website.
However, Turkey is not planning to make an agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), a presidential spokesman said on Sunday, as the country eyes funding options to cushion the economic impact of the coronavirus outbreak.