Russian stocks rise backed by favorable news from investment forum

MOSCOW, Feb 15 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market rose on Thursday supported by positive local corporate news, analysts said.

The MOEX Russia Index grew 0.33% to 2,265.45 and the RTS rose 1.4% to 1,262.27.

“The Russian benchmarks demonstrated uneven growth to continue an upward correction, which started earlier this week… the MOEX Russia Index continued driverless consolidation around a 2,275 mark,” Vitaly Manzhos, senior risk manager at investment company Nord Capital, said.

The market was mainly backed by positive news from the Russian Investment Forum held in the country’s southern resort of Sochi.

Independent gas producer Novatek grew 1.62% to 741.8 rubles after a report that it was e negotiating a sale of a stake in the Arctic LNG-2 liquefied gas facility to Saudi Aramco, Manzhos said.

Otkritie Broker analyst Andrei Kochetkov said Lukoil grew 0.57% to 3,730 rubles following a statement of CEO Vagit Alekperov that the company will increase dividends for 2017 by the inflation figure.

He also said that gold producer Polyus rose 0.51% to 4,490 rubles on the news its adjusted IFRS net profit increased 7% to $1.015 billion in 2017.

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

Company	Change, %	Last price, rbl	Trading volume, bln rbl
Sberbank	+0.97%	264.58	16.211
Gazprom	-1.32%	137.06	4.045
Norilsk Nickel	+0.2%	11785	3.739
Lukoil	+0.57%	3730	3.181
Magnit	+0.62%	4850	2.250

(57.5899 rubles – U.S. $1)

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