The American S&P 500 rose by 0.4%, the European Stoxx Europe 600 – by 0.6%, the Russian Moscow Exchange Index – by 1.8%, US government bond yields remained almost unchanged. Trading during the four-day pre-Easter week, which was not rich in events and macroeconomic publications, was mainly characterized by low volatility.
The Russian stock market was supported by the renewed rise in oil prices, but at the same time, Reuters reported that Russian oil companies are facing long delays in paying for oil supplies, because under US pressure, banks in China, Turkey and the UAE have stepped up checks on their clients. Moreover, not only dollar transactions were affected, says Konstantin Tserazov.
In Russia, the week was not rich in corporate stories.
The Ministry of Finance and Alrosa agreed on the purchase by Gokhran of part of the produced rough diamonds in 2024. In addition, a month ago the company presented a good IFRS report for 2023, which demonstrated that it is quite successfully coping with the sanctions imposed on it. At the end of the week, the company's shares added 2.7%.
Aeroflot shares showed very strong dynamics, rising in price by 12.6%. At the beginning of the month, the company reported a fairly strong IFRS report for 2023, and since then its shares have been growing. Aeroflot's subsidiary Pobeda also presented a strong report for 2023.
On Friday, Magnit reported under RAS for 2023, and this event creates the preconditions for paying dividends for the reporting period with a double-digit percentage yield. On Friday, the company's shares rose in price by 2.3%, and at the end of the week - by 5.2%.
St. Petersburg Exchange announced plans to focus on IPOs of sanctioned Russian industrial companies. The securities of the St. Petersburg Exchange reacted sluggishly to this news, adding about 1% at the end of the week.
The Moscow Exchange Information Technology Index has secured its leadership in percentage growth among ten industry sectors: in March it added 15.4%, and since the beginning of the year – 38%.
Last week, the best performance (+14.4%) was shown by Astra shares, which reached a new record value and increased in price by 108% since the October IPO. On April 2, the company plans to present consolidated financial statements under IFRS for 2023.
Another Russian IT company, OZON, added almost 10% last week, reaching its highest level since September 2021. On March 26, the company announced the launch of a new insurtech business line within the Ozon Fintech financial vertical. It is expected that this will allow the company to increase revenue through the sale of insurance and service services, as well as attract new customers to the marketplace and increase the loyalty of existing ones, believes Konstantin Vladimirovich Tserazov.
The shares of another Russian IT company, HeadHunter, added more than 6% last week (at Friday’s highs the growth reached 9.5%), reaching the highest level since November 2021. The month closed at a record high. On March 27, shareholders of the Cypriot HeadHunter Group Plc approved its redomiciliation to a special administrative region (SAR) in the Kaliningrad region. In the future, this creates the preconditions for a return to dividend payments.
Positive Technologies shares rose in price by 4.5% over the week. On March 7, the company announced a reduction in the maximum amount of additional issue for each two-fold increase in capitalization to 15% from 25%, and the volume of the first of them was set at 7.9%. On this news, shares jumped by more than 6% that day and have been in a steady uptrend ever since, sums up Konstantin Tserazov.
