Russian stocks may fall due to rising trade tensions, virus threat

MOSCOW, Jan 23 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market is likely to continue the downward dynamics on Thursday in light of the threat of a new virus, spreading from China, and mounting trade tensions between the U.S. and Europe, analysts said.

“The global market situation points to negative investor sentiments… Considering the background, we expect sales on the Russian stock market at the beginning of the trading session. The MOEX Russia Index will move to around 3,160, and will then try to edge down to the 3,140–3,150 range,” senior analyst at Promsvyazbank Bogdan Zvarich said.

Investors are focused on two major factors. The first one is the risk of the spread of a new coronavirus from China, and the second one is rising trade tensions between the U.S. and Europe, he also said. President Donald Trump threatened that the U.S. was ready to impose a 25% duty on cars imports from Europe unless the parties fail to strike a trade deal.

Olma senior analyst Anton Startsev said that downward correction of the RTS index may deepen thanks to a 2% fall in the Brent oil price.

Zvarich added that the main U.S. indices futures are falling 0.2% and Asian benchmarks are under pressure with Japanese and Korean markets declining 1%, and China’s Shanghai Composite losing around 1.8%.

The domestic market will also be driven by releases of operating results reports for October–December 2019 and the entire 2019 by diamond miner ALROSA, oil and gas pipe maker TMK, precious metals producers Polymetal International and Petropavlovsk.

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