Russian stocks seen flat on marginal oil, foreign market trends

MOSCOW, Jul 17 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market will likely open with marginal dynamics on Friday, following mixed and weak trends on foreign markets and in oil prices, analysts said.

"Consolidation slightly above 1,200 of the RTS index remains a viable scenario in the short term. Neither a quite 'soft-spoken' comment after a regular meeting of the European Central Bank (ECB), nor strong U.S. June retail data caused a significant recovery on the global trading floors," Olma senior analyst Anton Startsev said.

Finam analyst Alexei Korenev said that the foreign markets demonstrate mixed and muted trends on Friday morning.

The oil prices eased from their maximums of Thursday, there is no news to drive the market emerged and, according to Korenev, the market took a wait and see approach.

Baker Hughes is to present weekly drilling rig data but, according to Korenev, the statistics is not expected to affect the market a lot.

Alor Broker senior analyst Alexei Antonov said that the U.S. financial sector reports were the reason to be optimistic about the fact that large investors will deem the crisis not as deep as expected and restart purchases.

He said that the MOEX Russia Index will likely remain in a 2,700–2,810 range.

Surgutneftegas would trade without dividends for the first day but no big downward gap is expected due to a dismal amount of payments, the analyst said.

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