BIST sessions, price limits and lots
On Borsa Istanbul, trading happens at set hours, within daily price limits and in units called lots; the opening and closing moments have their own rules.
The chart above shows the hourly candles of a BIST stock. Crypto trades 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, but the Borsa Istanbul equity market is open only at set hours on weekdays. On the chart the candles are placed side by side; because there is no trading at night or at weekends, those hours do not appear at all. The last candle of one day sits right next to the first candle of the next, which is why you sometimes see a clear price jump (a gap) between two candles.
The day starts with an opening session. During this short window orders are collected and a single opening price is set; everyone trades at the same price. Then continuous trading begins: as buy and sell orders match, price changes in real time. At the end of the day there is a closing session, and the day's closing price is again set by collecting orders. That is why sudden jumps in the first and last candles of the day are normal.
Most BIST stocks have a daily price limit: price cannot rise or fall more than a set percentage from the previous day's close. The upper bound is called ‘ceiling’ (tavan) and the lower bound ‘floor’ (taban). In a stock locked at the ceiling there are many buyers but no sellers; at the floor it is the opposite. In that situation it becomes hard to trade.
Shares are bought and sold in ‘lots’; on BIST one lot is one share. The grey line on the chart is the average of the last 20 hourly candles and makes it easier to follow the short-term direction within the session.
How to read it
- Judge the first candle of the day separately: overnight news collected in the opening session hits the price all at once, so the first candle often opens with a gap.
- Before placing an order in a stock near its ceiling or floor, look at the order book: in a locked book your order joins a queue and may never fill.
- Know that orders placed close to the closing session may fill at the closing price. This session sets the close of the daily candle.
- A price jump between the first candle of a day and the last candle of the previous day is not a data error; the market was closed in between. Indicators are also calculated only from candles during trading hours.
In this state right now
Liquid BIST stocks whose daily change is currently near the ceiling or floor (moved more than 8 percent).
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Trap
The most common mistake is chasing a stock locked at the ceiling with a market order ‘for the rally to continue’. Since there are no sellers at the ceiling your order often does not fill; if the lock breaks, it usually fills right at the top. The second mistake is assuming an opening gap ‘will definitely close’ during the day. A gap sometimes closes within the day and sometimes never does; it is a probability, not a rule.
Tip
When you choose a time frame for BIST in the screener, keep the session hours in mind: a 4-hour candle covers more than half of a BIST trading day. For intraday trades the 1-hour chart, and for trades lasting a few days the daily chart, is easier to read.
Glossary
- Opening session
- The short window at the start of the day when orders are collected and a single opening price is set.
- Ceiling / floor
- The highest and lowest price a stock can reach that day.
- Lot
- The trading unit on the exchange; on BIST one lot is one share.
- Order book
- The list of waiting buy and sell orders by price level.
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Open a BIST stock's page →For information only, not investment advice.