Consumer confidence declines for third consecutive month amid geopolitical risks

Turkey's consumer confidence index continued to decline in February amid escalating geopolitical risks as the index saw a 7 percent of drop compared to January. 

The index fell to 66.64 points in February, down 4.98 points, or seven percent, from January, showed data from the Turkish Statistics Institute (TÜ?K) on Feb. 19.  

New data showed that a downward trend in consumer confidence which started in December has continued. 

The index increased sharply in November 2015 after the elections to its highest level since April 2014, as consumers' positive expectations rose about the general economic outlook after the Justice and Development Party (AKP) regained its parliamentary majority, according to analysts.

The index has, however, started to decline in the following months. 

Finansbank economist Gökçe Çelik said the three-month decline has been around 13.6 percent.
 
"We have seen that the speed recovery in the consumer index just after the November 2015 elections has now reversed. I believe specifically rising geopolitical and security risks have played a big role in this plunging trend," said Çelik, as quoted by Reuters. 

The worst deterioration among sub-indices was in the probability-of-saving index in February, suggesting less and less people expect to save money. The sub-index dipped 16.1 percent to 21.05 points.  Worries about employment were another negative element in consumer confidence as the number-of-people-unemployed expectation index was down 10.1 percent to 66.17 points, according to TÜ?K data. General economic confidence also dropped by 5.9 percent in February. The financial-situation-expectation index was the least negatively affected, as it fell 3.1 percent.

The index indicates...