Russian stocks fall following foreign bourses, quarantines

MOSCOW, Oct 30 (PRIME) – The Russian stocks contracted on Friday together with all other major international bourses, which sagged on new quarantines and poor company guidances, analysts said.

The MOEX Russia Index fell 0.68% to 2,690.59 and the RTS decreased 1.15% to 1,066.60.

“Investors are dissatisfied with the weak growth forecasts of the largest IT companies for the next few months, and the key U.S. indices lost up to 1.5% as a result. Europe priced in introduction of quarantine measures losing by up to 0.5%. Asia suffered solid correction with contraction of the key indices by 1.5–2%. The indices of the emerging countries also restarted their fall, and the MSCI Emerging Markets index fell by 1%,” Freedom Finance’s analyst Valery Yemelyanov said.

The RTS Index set a new short-term low of 1,160 during the day, while the MOEX Russia Index slightly outperformed the RTS due to the weakness of the ruble, Yemelyanov said.

Vitaly Manzhos, senior risk manager at investment company Algo Capital, said that the MOEX Russia Index and the RTS Index started the day with a dive as investors priced in significant worsening of the external background in the morning. But later the benchmarks regained some losses on economic statistics that showed fast recovery of some Western states.

“The quarterly increase of the Eurozone’s gross domestic product (GDP) by 12.7% in (July–September) acts as the key factor as it stands against a more moderate consensus forecast of 9.55%. Mind that yesterday the U.S. released unexpectedly strong estimate of third quarter GDP,  the indicator grew by 33.1% in annual terms,” Manzhos said, adding that it shows that not everything it lost for the global economy.

Yemelyanov also said that shares of steelmakers look more attractive than shares of oil companies  because of low oil prices. Novolipetsk Steel (NLMK), Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works (MMK), and Severstal grew by 2.72% to 186 rubles, 3.39% to 37.66 rubles, and 2.88% to 1,086.40 rubles, respectively.

Manzhos also said that ordinary and preferred shares of oil company Tatneft outperformed the market and rose 1.18% to 410.50 rubles and 0.99% to 397.30 rubles, respectively, as the company published robust financial performance in January–September.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	-2.21	201.03	15.659
Gazprom	-1.11	155.00	5.941
Lukoil	-0.31	4045.00	4.651
Norilsk Nickel	-0.72	18862.00	4.109
Tatneft	+1.18	410.50	2.896

(78.8699 rubles – U.S. $1)

End %%md/jst%%