Russian stocks fall on oil price plunge, unfinished pres summit

MOSCOW, Jul 7 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market closed fell on Friday on the back of a steep oil price decrease, while a much anticipated meeting between President Vladimir Putin and his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump did not change the trend because the market closed before any statements were made, analysts said.

The MICEX fell 0.56% to 1,912.48 and the RTS decreased 1.64% to 995.24.

“Russian stock market indices were trading in a clearly negative mood in the last day of the trading week, giving in to an unfavorable foreign background and a new wave of the black gold market sales,” Igor Kovalyov, an analyst at InstaForex, said.

The Brent price decreased by 2.54% to U.S. $46.89 per barrel as of 6:51 p.m. Moscow time, according to the ICE exchange.

Foreign markets continued to ruminating over a recent change in central banks’ attitudes, which, according to Kovalyov, also triggered sales in Russia.

Otkritie Broker analyst Timur Nigmatullin said that the RTS lost more than the MICEX as the ruble weakened.

The Putin–Trump meeting caused some market volatility, according to the analysts, but did not influence the trend in general because the statements summarizing the meeting had not been made by the time the Russian market closed.

Kovalyov said that ALROSA increased on news that rating agency S&P upgraded the company to BB+.

Nigmatullin said that Sberbank’s report under Russian Accounting Standards (RAS) was noteworthy because the net profit grew 38% in January–June.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	+1.2	152.16	8.635
Lukoil	-4.32	2856	3.115
Gazprom	+0.26	123	3.024
M.Video	+0.96	397.8	2.367
ALROSA	+3.09	93.4	2.285

(60.2426 rubles – U.S. $1)

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