Russian stocks may open slightly down on mixed environment

MOSCOW, Sep 26 (PRIME) -- Russian stocks are likely to edge down at Friday’s opening as mixed foreign background provides them with no strong upward drivers, analysts said.

“We expect the start of the trading session to be neutrally negative and do not rule out that if the foreign background worsens, the MICEX index can return to its 200-day average mark (of 1,425 points),” Promsvyzbank’s senior analyst Oleg Shagov said.

The general background prior to the market’s opening is mixed, as U.S. stock index futures are only slightly changing, while Asian floors showing mostly negative dynamics, and Brent oil prices remain almost flat around U.S. $97 per barrel.

“The Russian stock market will open lower today. Falling U.S. stock indices and consolidating oil prices on the commodities market will provide an up to 1% downward gap at the opening,” Denis Khripushin, analyst at 2trade.ru, said.

Investors will closely watch for the release of Germany’s and France’s consumer sentiment index, Italy’s business sentiment index, U.S. GDP data and the Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index.

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