Turkey

Turkey is currently enjoying lower borrowing costs and benefitting from a stable domestic financial sector, which showed itself to be far more resilient to the external shocks than in the past. Although Turkish bonds are seeing an increase in investment demand, risk aversion continues to be the main theme in the markets.

Turkey's economy is well on the way to erasing memories of recession, posting solid growth from late 2009 onwards, though recent woes in neighbouring Greece and beyond will have many in Ankara casting a wary sidelong glance towards the West.

Though the Turkish economy slid into recession, in part due to the steep decline in overseas trade and a falling off in domestic demand, there was no financial collapse as occurred during the downturn of 2001, with the banking sector not only surviving but prospering and the stock market riding a wave of growing activity.

Though there have been marked improvements across Turkey's educational infrastructure, the system needs further investment and development to meet the growing demands being placed upon it by the market.

Having gone through a period of consolidation and foreign investment, with many of the industry's leading firms taking on overseas partners, and having apparently ridden out the worst of the global financial crisis, Turkey's insurance sector appears to be again gaining momentum.