Russian stocks fall on oil price, foreign markets slide

MOSCOW, Dec 20 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market decreased on Thursday, falling with the rest of the global markets on the back of U.S. Federal Reserve System’s (Fed) decision to raise the key rate and lower oil prices, analysts said.

The MOEX Russia Index fell 0.24% to 2,352.88, and the RTS Index decreased 1.47% to 1,083.47.

“The decline of the Russian market was caused by general pessimism on foreign markets due to the U.S. Fed politics and continuing decrease of oil quotations,” Andrei Kochetkov, Otkritie Broker’s analyst, said.

Vitaly Manzhos, senior risk manager at investment company Algo Capital, said that in the evening the market bounced back and erased most of the losses.

Forex Club analyst Ivan Marchena said that the rest of the global markets decreased as well with the Asian markets falling by up to 2.8%, Japan’s Nikkei hitting a low since September 2017. The European markets decreased by up to 1.5%, and the U.S. stock market futures rose by only 0.2%.

Kochetkov said that oil and metals companies were among the market outsiders due to the oil price slide but RUSAL was an exception, jumping 15.33% after the U.S. Treasury Department asked the Congress to lift sanctions against the company.

Manzhos said that at the same time, it is worth mentioning that the U.S. added 18 Russians and four non-publicly traded entities to the blacklist, which might mean that Washington will avoid confronting large Russian companies, and this may be a good sign for the Russian assets.

Kochetkov said that Lukoil lost the most after an ex-dividend gap.

The annual press conference by President Vladimir Putin was not mentioned to having influenced the stock market in reports by the analysts.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	+0.24	189.3	16.685
Lukoil	-2.07	4808.5	7.438
Gazprom	-0.46	152.27	4.129
Norilsk Nickel	+0.7	13217	2.223
Novatek	+0.68	1127.7	1.367

(67.1121 rubles – U.S. $1)

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