Investing.com – Russia equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Mining, Power and Telecoms sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Moscow, the MICEX declined 0.95%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the MICEX were Sberbank (MCX:SBER), which rose 3.75% or 2.60 points to trade at 72.00 at the close. TMK ao (MCX:TRMK) added 3.04% or 1.40 points to end at 47.40 and Sberbank (pref) (MCX:SBER_p) was up 2.17% or 1.10 points to 51.80 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Transneft (pref) (MCX:TRNF_p), which lost 5.34% or 6740 points to trade at 119560 in late trade. SG mechel (MCX:MTLR) declined 5.14% or 3.68 points to end at 67.85 and ALROSA ao (MCX:ALRS) shed 5.07% or 3.500 points to 65.500.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 136 to 65 and 6 ended unchanged on the Moscow Stock Exchange.
The Russian VIX, which measures the implied volatility of MICEX options, was up 2.87% to 38.340.
In commodities trading, Gold for June delivery was down 0.65% or 7.80 to $1195.30 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in May rose 1.53% or 0.77 to hit $51.19 a barrel, while the May Brent oil contract rose 2.73% or 1.51 to trade at $57.06 a barrel.
USD/RUB was down 2.91% to 52.138, while EUR/RUB fell 3.87% to 55.595.
The US Dollar Index was up 0.97% at 99.22.