Russian stocks fall on investors’ worries about US trade limits

MOSCOW, Mar 7 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market decreased on Wednesday as investors were worried about news concerning U.S. trade restrictions, analysts said.

The MOEX Russia Index fell 0.52% to 2,291.23 and the RTS decreased 0.88% to 1,270.17.

“The external situation exerted the biggest pressure. The S&P 500 futures lost almost 1% on worries about escalation of trade wars after resignation of White House chief economic advisor Gary Cohn. Correspondingly, the domestic news did not support the market much,” Andrei Kochetkov, an analyst at Otkritie Broker, said.

The U.S. presidential administration earlier announced plans to raise steel and aluminum import duties and to strengthen the restrictions on Chinese investments.

Kochetkov said that the Russian market is largely unaffected by the recent U.S. trade measures but investors prefer to sell the assets.

Veles Capital analyst Alexei Adonin said that Russian investors were taking profit before the long holidays.

Igor Kovalyov, analyst at InstaForex group of companies, said that VTB soared on the back of a decision by S&P to upgrade the ratings of the bank.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	-0.01	274	13.634
Gazprom	-1.44	138.56	3.906
Magnit	-0.54	4973	2.534
Lukoil	-0.61	3721	2.513
VTB	+3.21	0.0547	2.043

(56.5041 rubles – U.S. $1)

End