Russian stocks may fall on mixed foreign environ, rating anxiety

MOSCOW, Jan 16 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market may decrease slightly at Friday opening as the optimism from rising oil prices could be spoiled by negative U.S. stock floors’ dynamics on Thursday and by fears that Standard & Poor’s could downgrade Russia’s credit rating, analysts said.

The external background prior to the Russian stock market opening is moderately positive with Brent oil price increase and mixed dynamics demonstrated by stock markets in the U.S. and Europe on Thursday, Platon Maguta, senior manager at Fond Maguta managing company, said. Still, both the RTS and the MICEX will see moderate downward gaps right at the session’s start, he said.

Brent rose 0.93% to U.S. $48.72 per barrel at 9.20 p.m. Moscow time on Thursday. In the U.S., the S&P 500 fell 0.92% and the Dow Jones lost 0.61%. In Europe, the key indices rose.

In Asia, only the Shanghai Stock Exchange is rising on Friday morning, which is a warning sign for Russian investors, Finam analyst Anton Soroko said.

Russian traders are still waiting to see whether Standard & Poor’s will downgrade the country’s rating to junk level, Andrei Dirgin, head of Alfa-Forex analytic department, said. “Nevertheless, the reaction to possible downgrade to junk level may be moderate as prices already include this scenario.”

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