Russian stocks close mixed on falling oil, ruble

MOSCOW, Sep 7 (PRIME) -- Russian stocks closed mixed on Monday as falling oil prices and a consequent decrease of the ruble pushed the RTS index down but kept the MICEX index afloat and close to neutral, analysts said.

The MICEX rose 0.18% to 1,701.18 and RTS decreased 2.20% to 776.17.

October futures for Brent oil lost 3.505% as of 6.45 p.m. Moscow time, according to the ICE exchange.

“The reason for a higher intraday volatility is the approaching expiration date for the closest ICE contracts amid a ‘thin’ market due to U.S. holidays. On the other hand, players are very sensitive toward a new phase of instability on the Chinese market, where indices fell after a 4-day weekend,” Timur Nigmatillun, an analyst at Finam, said.

This Thursday China is to publish its trade balance data, and if it is weak investors may think that the financial market’s instability has infected the producing sector of the economy, and may increase sales of crude, hurting the Russian market even more, Nigmatullin added.

“The Russian market…followed the oil price dynamics with the RTS index falling and the MICEX index marginally increasing supported by shares of exporting companies,” Alexander Kostyukov, an analyst at Veles Capital, said.

Russian non-oil-and-gas exporting companies increased on the back of a weaker ruble with metals companies Norilsk Nickel and Novolipetsk Steel (NLMK) and fertilizer producers Uralkali and PhosAgro rising 1.38%, 1.23%, 1.59% and 2.47%, respectively.

National flag carrier Aeroflot and troubled airline Transaero lost 2.15% and 8.72%, respectively, as investors were still reacting to news that Aeroflot plans to buy Transaero for 1 ruble, and also take over Transaero’s debt.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	-0.20	73.81	3.674
Gazprom	-0.79	141.67	2.554
Norilsk Nickel	+1.38	10716.00	1.160
Magnit	+0.72	12074.00	1.076
Lukoil	-0.46	2446.70	1.017

(67.6850 rubles – U.S. $1)

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