Russian stocks fall amid low oil, decreasing EU, US floors

MOSCOW, Feb 3 (PRIME) -- Russian stocks decreased on Wednesday pushed down by a fall of oil prices by the closing bell and a downward movement of E.U. and U.S. trading floors, analysts said.

The MICEX fell 0.68% to 1,746.35 and the RTS decreased 0.61% to 696.96.

“The statistics of U.S. hydrocarbon reserves posted in the evening pushed oil prices down to intraday minimums,” Vasily Tanurkov, an analyst at Veles Capital, said. Other factors which depressed the stocks included a fall in E.U. and U.S. stock indices, he said.

Artyom Zvyagilsky, an analyst at MFX Broker, said that the Russian stock market failed to swing to growth despite a sharp Brent price rebound.

The trading floor was put under pressure by macroeconomic forecasts of the central bank and the Economic Development Ministry, the analyst said.The central bank said that lower budget spending due to a rapid fall of oil prices will shave 0.2–0.3 percentage points off the gross domestic product (GDP) in 2016.

The Economic Development Ministry said that inflation will be higher than in the basic scenario in 2016 thanks to low oil prices.

Power producer E.ON Russia fell 2.55% to 2.716 rubles due to a fire at its Berezovskaya GRES, Vitaly Manzhos, an analyst at Obrazovanie Bank, said.

Other power producers likely rose on market speculations, Manzhos said. Power holding Inter RAO jumped 7.21% to 1.4195 rubles, Federal Grid Company of Unified Energy Systems (FGC UES) grew 3.56% to 0.06022 rubles and hydropower giant RusHydro increased 2.57% to 0.67 rubles.

Some profit-making utilities, including FGC UES and RusHydro, were likely supported by a government proposal to order state companies to pay 50% of their net profits in dividends, which was announced on Tuesday, according to Tanurkov.

Electronics retailer M.Video fell 1.41% to 259 rubles and grocery retailer Magnit decreased 1.75% to 10,955 rubles on investors’ fears that Russian consumer demand is falling on weak Russian PMI and dull macroeconomic forecasts, Manzhos said.

The Moscow Exchange, an investors’ safe haven amid a volatile market, rose 3.53% to 99.60 rubles.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	+0.14	94.53	10.774
Gazprom	-1.12	131.01	4.031
Lukoil	-0.62	2475.50	2.079
Rosneft	+0.48	273.10	1.194
VTB	-1.72	0.06952	1.160

(77.9273 rubles – U.S. $1)

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