Istanbul has most stock market investors

ISTANBUL

Istanbul remains the center of Türkiye’s equity markets with more than 1.6 million residents holding stock portfolios valued at 4.1 trillion Turkish Liras ($92.8 billion) as of the end of February, according to data from the Central Securities Depository. The city’s total portfolio value surged by 66.8 percent compared to the same month last year, representing an increase of approximately 1.6 trillion liras ($37.2 billion).

Ankara and İzmir followed as the second and third largest hubs for market participation. Ankara recorded 690,143 investors with a combined portfolio of 411.5 billion liras ($9.3 billion), an increase of 54.4 percent in value over the previous year. İzmir saw its portfolio value rise by 40.4 percent to reach 167.6 billion liras ($3.8 billion) across 448,731 investors. While portfolio values rose significantly across the three major cities, the number of individual investors in Istanbul and İzmir fell by 1.7 percent and 1 percent respectively, while Ankara saw a marginal increase of 0.8 percent.

Bursa maintained its position as the leading investment center outside the three largest metropolitan areas. As of late February, Bursa-based investors held 106.2 billion liras ($2.4 billion) in stocks with a total of 278,480 participants. Other cities with significant market footprints included Antalya, which reported a portfolio value of 67.4 billion liras ($1.5 billion), and Adana at 52.8 billion liras ($1.2 billion).

Among foreign investors, those based in the United States held the largest portion of the market with a total portfolio value of 732.9 billion liras ($16.6 billion). This wealth was distributed among 953 individual American investors and represented a 69.4 percent increase from the previous year. Qatar ranked second in foreign portfolio value at 719.7 billion liras ($16.3 billion) held by 10 investors, followed by the United Kingdom with 452.7 billion liras ($10.2 billion).