Investing.com – Russia equities were higher at the close on Thursday, as gains in the Telecoms, Mining and Oil & Gas sectors propelled shares higher.
At the close in Moscow, the MICEX gained 0.53%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the MICEX were Yandex NV (MCX:YNDX), which rose 6.46% or 85.00 points to trade at 1401.00 at the close. SG mechel (MCX:MTLR) added 5.97% or 9.88 points to end at 175.40 and Inter rao ees (MCX:IRAO) was up 2.71% or 0.1035 points to 3.9200 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Bashneft ANK ao (MCX:BANE), which lost 3.51% or 126.0 points to trade at 3463.5 in late trade. FSK EES (MCX:FEES) declined 2.03% or 0.0052 points to end at 0.2530 and AFK Sistema (MCX:AFKS) shed 1.30% or 0.300 points to 22.770.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 122 to 98 and 22 ended unchanged on the Moscow Stock Exchange.
The Russian VIX, which measures the implied volatility of MICEX options, was up 1.26% to 22.570.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for April delivery was up 0.64% or 7.85 to $1240.95 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in March fell 0.30% or 0.16 to hit $52.95 a barrel, while the April Brent oil contract fell 0.74% or 0.41 to trade at $55.34 a barrel.
USD/RUB was up 0.60% to 57.6000, while EUR/RUB rose 1.30% to 61.400.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.51% at 100.56.