Russian stocks to advance on oil price growth, OPEC meeting

MOSCOW, Jan 29 (PRIME) -- The Russian stock market will increase on Friday in the morning because the oil price surge has continued and investors expect OPEC to take steps to tackle the low prices at its meeting in February, analysts said.

“I expect a positive opening of the Russian stock market, at 1,770 of the MICEX but I do not rule out that the ‘Friday effect’ which manifests itself in investor desire to take profit after a rise during a week can dwarf growth continuation and even provoke a correctional fall,” Oleg Shagov, head of investment company’s Solid analytical department, said.

The RTS will likely form a rising trend with resistance at 750–760, Olma senior analyst Anton Startsev said.

Brent rose 1.56% to U.S. $34.42 at 8:51 a.m., Moscow time on information that OPEC and other large oil producing countries can meet in February to discuss oil output cuts, Shagov said.

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak confirmed his participation in the meeting, which investors saw as the first Russia’s practical step to tackle low oil prices, UFS IC analyst Alexei Kozlov said.

Apart from the oil price growth factor, the rest of the market signs are positive for Russian stocks on Friday: U.S. S&P 500 futures are edging up and Asian markets are growing, Kozlov said. The Bank of Japan has set a negative interest rate on deposits of commercial banks, which took Asian investors by surprise and caused a rally on the stock markets, Startsev said.

Investors’ interest in risky assets has been supported by reevaluation of the possible timeframe of the U.S. Federal Reserve System’s key rate increase and a weakening of the U.S. dollar, Startsev said.

A meeting of the Russian central bank’s board of directors will be the most important event on Friday, Shagov said.

End