Russian stocks grow on higher crude again amid mixed environ

MOSCOW, Sep 15 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market grew for the fourth day in a row on Wednesday following rising crude oil prices amid mixed external background, analysts said.

The MOEX Russia Index grew 0.24% to 4,065.53, and the RTS Index rose 0.69% to 1,766.67.

“The Russian stock market continued to move up today thanks to positive oil and gas markets,” Alexandra Ovchinnikova, an analyst at Sber Asset Management.

Veles Capital’s analyst Yelena Kozhukhova also attributed the increase to rising oil and rocketing gas prices. “Buyers in general are feeling particularly good about oil and gas securities in the context of commodity inflation at the moment,” she added.

According to Dmitry Babin, analyst at BCS World of Investment, the MOEX Russia Index set a new historical maximum, while the RTS Index reached the maximum level since August 2011.

The U.S. Department of Energy published the highly anticipated weekly report on oil reserves today, which showed a decrease of 6.4 million barrels, much worse than expected by experts. The news pumped oil prices even higher, especially against the background of a new hurricane menacing the U.S. oil output just like the previous one, Ida.

The gas market also dominated the Russian agenda today, as Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said that the Energy Ministry may soon prepare a report on the possibility of allowing oil company Rosneft to participate in gas exports via the Nord Stream-2 pipeline.

Ovchinnikova said that negative sentiment prevailed on Chinese platforms due to weaker than expected macroeconomic statistics.

Babin also said that risk assets were supported by weakening of the U.S. inflation. “This reduced the probability of an earlier and faster unwinding of the Federal Reserve’s monetary stimulus,” he said.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Gazprom	+1,07	342.6	35,215
Rosneft	+0,94	562.5	14,788
Sberbank	+2,07	333.24	13,952
Lukoil	+2,21	6715.5	9,406
Norilsk Nickel	-0,72	23872	6,383

(72.7171 – U.S. $1)

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