Russian stocks fall dragged by oil, foreign floors, US sanctions

MOSCOW, Apr 6 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market decreased on Friday dragged by falling oil prices, a weaker ruble, negative moods on foreign floors and new U.S. sanctions, analysts said.

The MOEX Russia Index fell 0.65% to 2,281.23 and the RTS decreased 1.36% to 1,236.48.

“The Russian stock market approached the end of trading on Friday bearing moderate losses. Already in the morning, amid falling U.S. stock index futures and Brent oil falling below U.S. $68 (per barrel), “bears” managed to regain the initiative and take the market to the negative territory. Later, our shares made attempts to restore, but by the end of trading sales prevailed again,” Freedom Finance senior analyst Bogdan Zvarich said.

Both dynamics in Europe, where main indices were falling by 0.4%, and the situation in the U.S., where Dow Jones and S&P500 indices were losing over 1% after the first hour and a half of trading, were a negative factor for the Russian market, the analyst said.

Aluminum giant UC RUSAL’s shares lost 17.73% and En+ Group’s global depositary receipts (GDRs) shrank 17.93% on reports that the companies were included in the new U.S. sanctions list. 

National top lender Sberbank lost 2% despite reporting that its net profit rose 26.4% on the year to 195.859 billion rubles in January–March, as calculated under Russian Accounting Standards (RAS).

State power grid holding Rosseti was among growth leaders, adding 7.89% on reports that its net profit grew 40% to 137.1 billion rubles in 2017, as calculated under International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS).

Below are the MOEX Russia Index’s five most active stocks on Friday:

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	-2	256.76	10.443
VTB	+2.69	0.0554	4.612
Gazprom	+0.71	141.50	3.861
Lukoil	-1.28	3939.00	2.251
Norilsk Nickel	-0.1	10733.00	1.385

(57.5796 rubles – U.S. $1)

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