Overbought Russian stocks fall on profit taking although oil rises

MOSCOW, Apr 14 (PRIME) -- Overbought Russian stocks fell on Thursday on profit taking, while the oil price dynamics did not play a significant role, analysts said.

The MICEX fell 0.88% to 1,915.85 and the RTS decreased 0.88% to 914.34.

“In spite of rising oil quotations, investors in the Russian stock market started selling long positions and taking profits, while stocks had risen fast in the last four days,” Alexander Kostyukov, an analyst at Veles Capital, said.

Raiffeisen Capital analyst Sofya Kirsanova said that stocks were overbought and the MICEX has increased almost 20% since January 15.

InstaForex analyst Igor Kovalyov said that oil prices were not a strong growth driver today, because benchmarks were at a high level, and an oil freeze meeting in Doha will be held on Sunday.

Irkutskenergo jumped 11.67% to 19.33 rubles, as the Federal Antimonopoly Service have recently cleared the Telmamskaya GES hydropower plant, a unit of power firm EuroSibEnergo, to buy 40% shares in the power utility, according to Kirsanova.

Oil producer Bashneft went up 3.43% to 2,816 rubles, because Economic Development Minister Alexei Ulyukayev said that the state plans to sell a stake in the company to a strategic investor at an above market price, Kostyukov said.

Otkritie Broker analyst Andrei Kochetkov said that state-run Bashneft was supported by the news that such banks as JPMorgan, Citigroup, Barclays, Deutsche Bank, Raiffeisen, Credit Suisse, UBS and UniCredit plan to take part in Russian privatization, according to news daily Izvestiya.

Below are the MICEX’ five most active stocks on Thursday:

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	-0.17	119.30	10.449
Gazprom	-1.76	150.43	7.630
Lukoil	-0.34	2814.50	4.287
Norilsk Nickel	+0.32	9150.00	3.846
VTB	-2.54	0.07485	2.196

(65.7662 rubles – U.S. $1)

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