Well, this is hardly news anymore, but Moscow's stock markets were closed again this morning. The news will obviously be in future when they are open. Russia's Micex Stock Exchange and RTS suspended trading this morning because their "technical indexes'' a measure of aggregate stock prices, fell more than 10 percent on opening. Russian global depositary receipts plunged in London trading following the decision, led by steelmakers. The FTSE Russia IOB Index, a measure of Russian depositary receipts trading in London, sank 11 percent to 312.83 at 9:36 a.m. in London, the lowest in almost five years. OAO Severstal, Russia's biggest steelmaker, fell 23 percent to $2.50. Evraz Group SA, the second-largest steelmaker, dropped 15 percent to $10.60, or 92 percent below its May 16 high.The Ruble SlidesThe ruble fell to an 18-month low against the dollar this morning even while ...

Russia's long-term sovereign credit rating outlook was lowered yesterday (Thursday) - to negative - by Standard & Poor's Ratings Services due to their assessment that the cost of the government's "bank rescue operation'' may increase. S&P cut their outlook from stable, a move which reflects the increased probability of a downgrade at some point in the future. Russia has committed as much as 15 percent of gross domestic product in budgetary and reserve funds to maintain banking liquidity, according to calculations made by the rating agency. At the same time S&P affirmed Russia's BBB+ long-term foreign currency and the A- long-term local currency ratings and the short-term ratings of A-2.``We expect Russian corporate and financial sector default rates to increase asdebtors' access to official funds will vary,'' S&P said in the statement.``Other uncertainties remain regarding what the economic policy response will ...

MSCI tries to tackle Russian liquidity issues with new indexes that include stocks listed outside of the country. 

 

 

MSCI Barra has created two new Russia indexes to mitigate the problems recently exposed with the frequent suspension of trading on the Russian stock markets during the global market unrest.

The new MSCI Barra indexes will capture the performance of Russian stocks that are traded outside Russia, during trading halts in Moscow.

The MICEX Stock Exchange and Russia Trading System (RTS) have halted trading for more than a full day twice since September.

What's more, new trading halt rules have been put in place at a furious pace, adding to jittery investors' lack of comfort with Russian equities trading.

Most recently, the Russian regulatory authority on Tuesday implemented a one-hour trading halt in the event that the MICEX or RTS technical indexes rise by more than 10% or fall by more than

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Russian stock exchanges had to halted trading again today (Friday) for the fourth successive day running, but this time the explanation was a rather different one - since stocks rapidly surged higher, following President Medvedev's announcement yesterday that the government was going to inject funds into the purchase of Russian stocks. Exchanges suspended trading after just hours of trading Friday after shares on the benchmark RTS and MICEX indexes shot up by 20 percent and 26.3 percent, respectively. Trading was only temporarily suspended and was expected to resume later today.Stocks bounced back after the government rushed through a series of emergency measures — amounting to some $120 billion worth of relief — in the shape of increased liquidity to the banking sector and share purchases on the domestic markets. In fact Russia's RTS Index, which had previously been the best global stock performer this decade, had turned ...

Russian stock exchanges had to halted trading again today (Friday) for the fourth successive day running, but this time the explanation was a rather different one - since stocks rapidly surged higher, following President Medvedev's announcement yesterday that the government was going to inject funds into the purchase of Russian stocks. Exchanges suspended trading after just hours of trading Friday after shares on the benchmark RTS and MICEX indexes shot up by 20 percent and 26.3 percent, respectively. Trading was only temporarily suspended and was expected to resume later today.Stocks bounced back after the government rushed through a series of emergency measures — amounting to some $120 billion worth of relief — in the shape of increased liquidity to the banking sector and share purchases on the domestic markets. In fact Russia's RTS Index, which had previously been the best global stock performer this decade, had turned ...

Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev today pledged $20 billion in financial support for the Russian stock market and cut oil taxes in an attempt to bring a halt to what has now become Russia's worst financial crisis in a decade. Medvedev took this action in order to try to lay the basis for a reopening of Russia's bourses tomorrow, following three days of irregular operation on the back of a 25% drop in the Micex Index. Following the announcement Russian shares traded in London surged and the interbank lending rate plunged.The announcement followed a meeting between Medvedev, the central bank Chairman Sergey Ignatiev and Russia's Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin. Ignatiev also announced that central bank reserve requirements for Russia's banks would be eased in an attempt to provide more liquidity.The tax cut for oil exports will come into effect on Oct. 1 and save producers and refiners ...