Russian stocks seen growing as oil approaches to $50 level

MOSCOW, Aug 18 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market will possibly open with a small upward gap on Thursday because oil prices have almost reached the U.S. $50 per barrel threshold, analysts said.

“There are no factors suggesting a decrease from the absolute maximums, as well as a power to reset them. We think that an increase to 2,000 is more probable,” Roman Tkachuk, a senior analyst at investment company Okey Broker, said.

“The patterns of the U.S. Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) minutes did not give reasons for a fast increase of the interest rate, which became a factor of the U.S. dollar weakening on the foreign currency market and of some improvement of the situation on commodities markets,” Olma senior analyst Anton Startsev said.

The fact that Brent has approached the $50 per barrel level is a positive factor for the Russian market, he said. On Thursday in the morning, oil futures began to fall but this is a small correction and must not be perceived negatively, Vitaly Manzhos, a senior analyst at Bank Obrazovanie, said.

The oil futures’ dynamics and to some extent, a release of the U.S. jobless claims statistics, will form the Russian market dynamics later on Thursday, Manzhos said.

The ruble is expected to strengthen, which will favor the quotations of Sberbank, Yevgeny Loktyukhov, head of the capital market analysis department at Promsvyazbank, said.

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