Russian stocks fall on oil taxation uncertainty, China econ worries

MOSCOW, Sep 21 (PRIME) -- Russian stocks decreased on Monday in thin trade after trading halts, as investors were worried about the situation on emerging countries’ trading floors and China’s low MNI index, as well about plans to adjust oil industry taxation, analysts said.

The MICEX fell 0.65% to 1,699.72 and the RTS decreased 0.95% to 808.78.

“Concern about the situation on emerging markets, which became one of the factors contributed to the postponement of an increase of the U.S. key rate, has reached Russian trading floors as well,” Igor Kovalyov, an analyst at InstaForex, said. “It has been known today that the MNI China Business Sentiment index fell short of forecasts and gave rise to fears for the state of China’s economy,” he said.

The MICEX was particularly depressed by downward dynamics of oil and gas stocks caused by the news that the Finance Ministry suggested increasing the tax burden in the oil industry to elp balance the state budget for 2016, Vasily Oleinik, an analyst at ITinvest, said.

Trade volumes fell significantly after the Moscow Exchange suspended trading, Vitaly Manzhos, a senior analyst at Bank Obrazovanie, said. The bourse halted trading in FORTS (Futures and Options on RTS) twice earlier on Monday; the latest restart of the trade was at 12.40 p.m. Moscow time.

Oil major Lukoil fell 3.02% on the back of the uncertainty concerning the mineral extraction tax in the oil sector, while Tatneft’s preferred stocks decreased 3.03% and Bashneft’s preferred stocks fell 3.95%.

Russian power utilities rebounded after their fall on September 18 on market speculations, which are particularly high in this segment, Manzhos said.

Federal Grid Company of Unified Energy Systems (FGC UES) jumped 4.65%, Mosenergo rose 3.47%, Russian Grids grew 3.33%, and Inter RAO gained 1.76%.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	+0.58	75.94	5.987
Lukoil	-3.02	2331.10	5.145
Gazprom	-0.04	139.45	2.901
Rosneft	-2.70	249.10	1.632
Norilsk Nickel	-0.18	11080.00	1.380

(65.6445 rubles – U.S. $1)

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