Russian stocks fall as cbank starts foreign currency purchases

MOSCOW, May 14 (PRIME) -- Russian stocks fell on Thursday depressed by the central bank’s decision to start regular foreign currency purchases to replenish the foreign exchange reserves and to stop excessive strengthening of the ruble in order to support exporters, analysts said.

The MICEX fell 0.28% to 1,677.57 and the RTS decreased 2.52% to 1,054.90.

“It is likely that investors’ mood was spoiled by the central bank’s decision to start purchasing foreign currency from the market,” Natalya Samoilova, head of Golden Hills-Kapital’s analytical department said.

The central bank said it will be buying U.S. $100 million to $200 million per day to replenish the foreign exchange reserves, Gleb Zadoya, head of Profit Group’s analytical department, said, adding that this move will support Russian exporters.

The central bank’s actions will strengthen the Russian economy positions in the global economy, as well as may improve investment attractiveness of the country in the future, but the stock market viewed the bank’s intervention decision as an attempt to stop strengthening of the ruble, Samoilova said.

The RTS incurred greatest losses due to weakening of the ruble to above 50 against the dollar after the regulator announced the decision, she said.

A further fall of the market was limited by a recent decision of the government to provide 300 billion rubles from the National Wealth Fund to state Vnesheconombank, the analyst said.

Construction company Mostotrest rose 1.10% after its shareholders approved paying 2 billion rubles in dividends for 2014.

Vozrozhdenie Bank fell 0.48% after reporting a 92.6% fall in net profit for January–March, as calculated under Russian Accounting Standards.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	-1.24	74.31	6.695
VTB	-1.29	0.06515	4.600
Gazprom	+0.04	151.80	2.980
Norilsk Nickel	-1.82	10245.00	2.191
Lukoil	-0.38	2610.10	1.836

(49.5366 rubles – U.S. $1)

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