New Firm Creation in Turkey

This data set has new joint stock corporations and new limited liability companies created monthly between January 1995 and January 2019. The two most common types of companies in Turkey are and have been joint stock corporations and limited liability companies, together accounting for around 98 per cent of all new businesses created. The Turkish Commercial Code (Law No. 6762 of July 2, 1956) was in effect between 1.1.1957 and 1.7.2012 and shaped the economic and commercial activity in Turkey for over fifty years. The needs of the new millennium coupled with the harmonization process with EU legislation resulted in the new Turkish Commercial Code (Law No. 6102), which was enacted on January 13, 2011 and came into force on July 1, 2012. T he new Turkish Commercial Code decreased transaction costs for joint stock corporations relative to limited liability companies and led to a marked increase in the number of new firms adopting the corporation organizational form. Using this data we can investigate if the new commercial code resulted in a structural break in the choice of organizational form of new companies. The Bai-Perron procedure identifies a structural break that coincides with the new commercial code