Profit taking leads to correction on Russian stock market; MICEX dips back to 1200 pts
MOSCOW. Sept 17 (Interfax) - The Russian stock market once again rose to its highest level this year on Thursday as it reacted to positive trends on global exchanges, but profit taking then led to a correction and the market ended the day in negative territory.
The RTS index fell 1.24% to 1231.41 points on Thursday, while the MICEX decreased 1.03% to 1205.12 points. The RTS was up to 1262.02 points in early trading and the MICEX peaked at 1241.04 points, both year-highs.
RTS futures indicate investors have a neutral outlook on the market.
Sberbank led the way in terms of profit taking and saw its shares decline 4.5% on the MICEX and 5.6% on the RTS.
VTB Bank shares fell 2.9% on the MICEX after rising 7.4% in the morning.
Gazprom stock declined 0.3%, Lukoil - 2.1%, Gazprom Neft - 1%, Surgutneftegas - 2.7%, Tatneft - 1% and Polyus Gold - 1.2%.
Rosneft shares rose 0.8%, Transneft - 3.1% and MMC Norilsk Nickel - 4.4% (and 1.3% on the RTS).
Global indices continued to rise on Thursday due to a slew of positive factors, above all statistics on the U.S. real estate and labor markets as well as manufacturing data.
WTI oil for November was up to $72.96 per barrel on Thursday evening.
In second-tier trading, PIK Group shares rose 29.4%, Kamaz - 12.5%, RTM - 6.3% and Sibirtelecom - 3.8%.
OGK-3 shares fell 7.6%, TGK-1 - 6.4%, TGK-13 - 5.9% and Sollers - 5.1%.
RTS Classic Market trading volume totaled $11.274 million on Thursday, RTS Standard turnover was $323.714 million and MICEX volume was 88.965 billion rubles, led by Sberbank with 24.08 billion rubles.