Russian stocks seen falling as OPEC+ fail to agree on extra steps

MOSCOW, Apr 22 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market will likely fall at opening on Wednesday after a the OPEC+ members did not agree on additional oil market measures, analysts said.

"New attempts to test the 1,000 level of the RTS index are possible today at the start of trade under the pressure of external factors," investment company Olma’s senior analyst Anton Startsev said.

The OPEC plus members held an extraordinary video conference on Tuesday but failed to agree on any additional measures of market support, Startsev said.

Bloomberg reported that during the call that Algeria suggested starting production cuts immediately instead of May 1 as scheduled earlier, but Russia most probably did not participate in the meeting.

Sergei Drozdov, analyst at investment company Finam, said that oil remained under the pressure of dramatically reduced global demand and speculative sales of futures. Brent dove to U.S. $18 on Tuesday, losing about 25% of its value. "But no panicked sales were seen in the segment of blue chips, which means that the players seems to expect that panic on the energy markets will soon fade," he said. 

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