Istanbul's Finance Center breaks ground

The groundbreaking ceremony for the Capital Market Board (CMB) and Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency (BDDK) buildings, developed by the Housing Development Administration of Turkey (TOKİ) as a part of the Istanbul International Finance Center (IIFC) in Istanbul's Ataşehir district and attended by Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım was held on Saturday.

During a speech at the ceremony, Prime Minister Yıldırım said that the world's hard cash is seeking new addresses, since the U.S. and Europe are pushing international investors more and more in relation to the origin of their property, and that Turkey is the perfect place for investors. Furthermore, he stated that this is the reason why they decided to initiate such a project.

At the IIFC, which is said will turn Istanbul into "a regional and a global financial center," 50,000 people will be employed and it will have 25,000 daily visitors once opened. The project is aimed at developing the conditions required for Istanbul to rank among the leading financial centers of the world. More precisely, the project aims at developing a legal infrastructure up to international standards, adding to diversity of financial products and services, simplifying and increasing the efficiency of the taxation system, improving the regulatory and supervisory framework, strengthening the physical and technological infrastructure, providing a training infrastructure to meet the requirement for qualified human resources and creating an organizational structure that will realize promotional and monitoring activities worldwide.

Among the joint infrastructure work being launched in the scope of the financial center include an administrative building, a police station, a health center, fire department, continuing education center, various academic courses, a mosque, a nursery, an underground parking lot and a trestle will all be built, bringing together joint infrastructure work in the financial center for financial sector giants like the Capital Market Board (SPK), the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency (BDDK), Ziraat Bank and Vakıfbank. The infrastructural work also includes environmental planning to be completed in tandem with the finance center by the first quarter of 2019.