Turkey's Taksim Square, with the figure of Kemal Ataturk, the first president, and the Turkish flag in the background.
Turkey's central bank hiked its key interest rate to 30% on Thursday, a 500-basis point jump from 25%, as Ankara continues to battle double-digit inflation.
Traditional economic orthodoxy holds that rates must be raised to cool inflation, but Erdogan — a self-declared "enemy" of interest rates who calls the tool "the mother of all evil" — vocally espoused a strategy of lowering rates instead.
After starting on its hiking path, the central bank in July stated its aim to get inflation down to 5% in the medium term — an ambitious forecast, as Turkey's annual inflation jumped to near 59% in August.
Ankara now expects annual inflation to reach 65% at the end of 2023, up from a forecast of 24.9% a year ago.
Persons:
Turkey's, Kemal Ataturk, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Erdogan —, —
Organizations:
Turkish, greenback
Locations:
Ankara, Istanbul, Turkey