Turkey’s Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (TMSF) has put İstikbal Mobilya, a major furniture company seized from the Boydak family over alleged links to the faith-based Gülen movement, up for auction again after a previous sale drew no buyers.
According to the tender notice, published in the Official Gazette on Tuesday, TMSF is offering 100 percent of the company’s shares with an estimated value of 16.5 billion Turkish lira ($371 million), requiring bidders to submit a deposit of 825 million lira to participate.
A previous attempt to sell İstikbal in September 2025 drew no buyers, while Bellona, another furniture brand formerly owned by the family, was sold in May 2025 for 8.1 billion Turkish lira ($213 million).
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has targeted followers of the Gülen movement, inspired by the late Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, since corruption investigations in December 2013 implicated him as well as some members of his family and inner circle. He dismissed the probes as a Gülenist conspiracy and later designated the movement a terrorist organization in May 2016, intensifying a sweeping crackdown after a coup attempt in July of the same year that he accused Gülen of orchestrating. The movement denies involvement in the coup attempt or any terrorist activity.
According to figures published by Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency in July 2025, Turkish authorities have seized 784 companies with a total asset value of 42.3 billion Turkish lira at the time of their takeover, an estimated $14 billion in 2016 USD terms, as part of the sweeping crackdown on the Gülen movement that followed the abortive putsch.
Asset sales have continued in the months following that report. Last September cable manufacturer HES Kablo was sold for 18.6 billion lira (about $450 million), while major apparel retailer Aydınlı Group fetched 20.3 billion lira (about $490 million) and energy company RHG Enertürk sold for $110 million.
Critics contend that the asset sales represent the culmination of a broad confiscation policy that has stripped thousands of people of their property without judicial oversight or due process. Human rights groups warn that such measures constitute collective punishment and violate international conventions protecting the right to property and prohibiting arbitrary deprivation.
