"Strong government plays role in winning over sceptics in Turkey's business sector
By Vincent Boland
Published: January 21 2005 02:00 | Last updated: January 21 2005 02:00
If the state of a country's economy can be judged by the quality of the paper its money is printed on, Turkey's is in rude good health. At the start of the year the central bank introduced crisp 'new' Turkish lira notes, minus six zeros, to replace the inflation-ravaged old ones, often so shabby they were held together with adhesive tape.
The redenomination is not just cosmetic. Turkey's economic decline and high inflation during the 1990s led to a steep loss of value in the currency that has now been halted. Inflation fell to 9.3 per cent in 2004, the first time since 1972 that it has been in single figures. The 1990s average was 77.5 per cent, according Serhan Cevik, an analyst at Morgan Stanley in London."
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