Turkey Expands Scope Of The FX Payment Prohibition

The Capital Movements Circular ("Circular") has been amended with the letter of Ministry of Treasury and Finance of Republic of Turkey numbered 940051.

Mersis is an electronic trade registry, which is highly popular and a significant e-portal for attorneys and companies.

Turkey has moved from a largely unregulated crypto market to one of the more tightly supervised regimes in the region. For foreign investors, exchanges, and businesses holding digital assets with a Turkish nexus, understanding the current framework is no longer optional.

The information relating to Turkiye is provided for background purposes only. The information presented herein has been extracted from and is presented on the authority of various public official documents and private publications.

With its decision No. 57/1708 dated 17.09.2026, the Capital Markets Board (the “CMB”) set out the liquidation procedures for the 131 investment funds established by Tera, A1 Capital, Atlas, Bulls, Hedef, Pardus and Pusula Portföy Yönetimi, whose liquidation had been ordered under its previous decision, and updated the relevant list of funds in the same decision.

This article examines the legal and practical framework for opening and operating a Turkish bank account as a foreign national or foreign-owned business. It distinguishes statutory customer-identification and anti-money-laundering duties from each bank's own customer-acceptance policy. The discussion addresses passports,

SPK, halka açık olmayan ortaklıkların halka arz başvurularını ilan edilen sıradan bağımsız olarak önceliklendirmek üzere üç alternatif kriter belirledi

The Capital Markets Board of Türkiye has introduced comprehensive regulatory reforms affecting hedge funds and portfolio management companies, implementing new investment diversification requirements, graduated ownership caps based on free-float ratios, enhanced capital adequacy standards, and stricter personnel qualifications. These changes, effective from August 2026, establish tiered compliance deadlines and fundamentally reshape the operational framework for Turkish portfolio managers.

On 16 September 2026, the money market funds founded by Pusula Portföy Yönetimi A.Ş. defaulted after failing to meet the cash redemption requests received from investors, triggering a sharp sell off on Borsa Istanbul. The BIST 100 index lost 5.54% that same day and hit a circuit breaker; the selling soon spread to Tera Portföy funds as well. It became apparent that the problem was not confined to those two firms but also extended to Hedef, Atlas, A1 Capital, Pardus and Bulls Portföy.

Borsa Istanbul’s BIST 100 index came under significant selling pressure over three consecutive trading sessions between 15-17 September 2026. The index closed down 5.54% on 16 September, a move that triggered Borsa Istanbul’s index-linked circuit breaker, and negative momentum continued into the morning of 17 September. The sell-off was primarily triggered by a default at Pusula Portföy Yönetimi A.Ş., a portfolio management company, which failed to meet investor redemption requests from certain funds it manages in a timely manner. A similar liquidity problem emerged at Tera Portföy Yönetimi A.Ş., and this situation put pronounced pressure on the shares of both companies as well as on broader market indices.