The headline news on economic growth as Turkey’s Erdogan administration would like you to read it: Turkey’s gross domestic product (GDP) expanded by 4.8% y/y in 2Q25 after growing 2.3% y/y in 1Q25, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK, or TurkStat), said on September 1.

Two points the observer should not overlook: Official data provider TUIK employed a widescope revision of its GDP data once again and it is not advisable to plan, price or draw inferences based on TUIK data, given the widespread concern about the reliability of Turkey’s official data series.

TUIK also stated that the 2Q25 growth rate was 1.6% q/q versus the 0.7% q/q posted for 1Q25. The same caveats apply.

Comedy value

Macro data releases do indeed provide good headlines for the media that require little effort. Reports are regularly spun up on economies cooling and economies overheating. Yet in reality – a field much overlooked by the media – the macro data so often amounts to a total nonsense.

In Turkey, the comedy value of the nonsense is frequently heightened with data revisions. Based on the latest GDP data set, Turkey did not even feel the pinch of a technical recession in 2024. Nevertheless, the talk of a technical recession last year generated by pre-revised figures was handy for officials when it came to fulfilling finance industry demands for tightening.

Not the media’s job (though is should be)

Simply noting the comedy in Turkey's macro data releases is, however, unfair given that all other macro data providers also insult the intelligence of their audiences. But it is not generally the media’s job (though it should be) to allow rude intrusions of reality by putting forward some ideas of their own on what has been put into circulation.

If Syria’s President Ahmed Al-Sharaa has the right to announce that he is signing billions of dollars of investment deals, Turkey certainly has the right to announce that it is growing magnificently. It is the reader’s responsibility, alas, to determine what these “growth” headlines actually mean because it is not often that you can expect the media to do it for you.

Turkey, top for exaggeration

Neverthless, Turkey's top-of-the-table tendency to exaggerate the good news that its economic indicators supposedly show means it is an absolute outlier. Vice President Cevdet Yilmaz (@_cevdetyilmaz) and purveyor of “orthodox” economic management Mehmet Simsek (@memetsimsek), the ex-investment banker from Merrill Lynch who serves as the Turkish finance minister, reiterated in their tweets on the latest GDP figures how Turkey is set to become a high-income country based on the World Bank classification when the 2025 data is released.

“Top” media personnel will take this “fact” as a given. They will treasure it as a new font of clickable headlines. Some bogus analysis might even creep through. Might this milestone relate to Turkey's endless “breakthroughs” in defence technologies? Surely, it must be so, for this defence prowess is so often wildly praised by the Western press! (Whereas in reality, whether we are talking tanks, planes, ships or other hardware, “Turkish” defence industry advances are almost always based on vital shipped-in components).

No room for negativity

According to Turkey’s central bank, the Turkish economy’s output gap turned negative (the official GDP growth releases have fallen below potential growth, a measure that can be simplified as long-term average growth) in 3Q24 and was poised to remain there.

Stand back. Admire the use of statistics as a real “scientific” tool. Turkey’s official GDP growth rates are booming while the output gap remains negative. Everyone is happy.

Not so difficult to suss out

What is actually going on in this game of manipulated appearance and reality is not so difficult to suss out.

In September 2024, the Erdogan administration gave an official GDP growth release target of 4% y/y for 2025 in its new medium-term economic programme (OVP). This month, a new OVP will be released.

On March 1, a day after the 4Q24 data was released, bne IntelliNews anticipated: “Above 4% for 2025.”

On May 30, when the 1Q25 data was published, this publication noted: “And despite the regime’s tentative approach to the first quarter, the 4% bet still stands.”

On December 1, TUIK will release its 3Q25 data. Keep your wits about you.