May 7 (Reuters) – Borsa Istanbul, Turkey’s state-run stock exchange, has dismissed three senior personnel after a restructuring eliminated their jobs, an official at the exchange told Reuters on Wednesday.
The decision to discharge two deputy general managers and the head of research at Borsa Istanbul came at a May 2 board meeting, the official told Reuters on condition his name was not used.
It was not immediately clear whether the dismissals were linked to a series of purges at other state institutions in recent weeks after a high-level corruption scandal broke late last year.
The Capital Markets Board, Turkey’s financial-markets regulator, dismissed three deputy chairmen and 11 other senior members on April 25 in a move that one source said was government retaliation for the graft investigation, which involved Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s inner circle. Members of the state banking regulator have also been removed from their posts.
“As part of the ongoing organisational restructuring at Borsa Istanbul, deputy general managers Ali Coplu and Mustafa Baltaci were relieved of their duties,” the exchange official said. “Because the research and business-development sections were merged, the research manager Orhan Erdem was also relieved of his duties.”
Borsa Istanbul declined to comment. The three who lost their jobs were not immediately available for comment.
Nasdaq OMX Group took a 5 percent stake in Borsa Istanbul, which houses the stock, gold and derivatives exchange, at the end of 2013.
Erdogan has denounced the graft probe as a plot against his rule orchestrated by his former ally Fethullah Gulen, a U.S.-based Muslim cleric who has many supporters among Turkey’s police, judiciary and other arms of the bureaucracy. Thousands of police officers and prosecutors have been reassigned. (Reporting by Birsen Altayli; Writing by Ayla Jean Yackley; Editing by Larry King)
via Turkey’s Borsa Istanbul dismisses three senior staff | Reuters.