EMERGING MARKETS-Turkish lira slides 6%; Brazil mall operators jump

By Susan Mathew Dec 29 (Reuters) - Turkey's lira slid another 6% on Wednesday, and Brazil's real and the Colombian peso also fell, while shares in Brazilian mall operators BR Malls and Aliansce Sonae and BR Malls jumped on a possible tie-up. The lira fell for a third straight session, to around 12.65 to the dollar at 1424 GMT. It was about 16% down on the week, after surging more than 50% last week from record lows of 18 per dollar. Worries about politically driven unconventional Turkish central bank policies have hammered the currency this year. In a Reuters poll, annual inflation was expected to exceed 30% this month, while the benchmark interest rate has been cut to 14%. Implied volatility gauges held near record highs hit in recent days, data from Fenics showed.,, While Turkey should be of little importance for foreign institutional equity investors, accounting for only 0.2% of the MSCI EM index, Hasnain Malik, head of equity research at Tellimer, said its average daily value traded was close to $2bn over the last six months, placing it above Saudi Arabia, South Africa and Russia. Turkish stocks, which had scaled all-time highs this month, were about 21% below those levels on Wednesday. On the day, they were up about 2%, while on the year they have gained 28%. In Latin America, a steady dollar and higher copper prices lifted Chile's peso 0.7%. Chile's central bank had considered hiking the interest rate by as much as 150 basis points this month, before deciding to raise by 125 bps, minutes showed. Mexico's peso firmed for the fifth time in six session, while Brazil's real fell 0.3%, with eyes also on month-end derivative settlements that could turn the direction of the currency. Falling oil prices weighed on Colombia's peso and Latam oil producers such as Petrobras. Courts in four Brazilian states have suspended a 50% hike in natural gas prices planned by Petrobras, likely kicking off an intense legal battle between the state-run enterprise, the distributors that buy its fuel and various political authorities. But losses on Sao Paulo's Bovespa stocks index were capped by BR Malls, whose shares rose 2.7% after it confirmed that Aliansce Sonae Shopping Centers had contacted it to evaluate an acquisition or tie-up. A tie-up would create the biggest mall operator in Brazil. Aliansce shares were up 3.3% Key Latin American stock indexes and currencies at 1407 GMT: Stock indexes Latest Daily % change MSCI Emerging Markets 1220.46 -0.54 MSCI LatAm 2109.10 -0.12 Brazil Bovespa 104618.30 -0.23 Mexico IPC - - Chile IPSA 4257.15 -0.29 Argentina MerVal - - Colombia COLCAP 1408.20 0.25 Currencies Latest Daily % change Brazil real 5.6543 -0.28 Mexico peso 20.5664 0.37 Chile peso 848.9 0.68 Colombia peso 4011.6 -0.15 Peru sol 3.9446 0.07 Argentina peso 102.6700 -0.05 (interbank) (Reporting by Susan Mathew in Bengaluru; additional reporting by Karin Strohecker in London.)