What happened in the world of finance in a week # 5

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The previous edition of the information digest can be found at this link .
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Currency markets

At the beginning of last week, the ruble rate stabilized somewhat - on Tuesday, the dollar exchange rate fell below 53.5 rubles, while the official euro rate fell by 2.5 rubles.

At the same time, for example, the sellers of Apple equipment (Svyaznoy and Yulmart), following the company itself from Cupertino, changed the prices of gadgets at the rate of 77 rubles per euro .



This is how the head economist of ITinvest Sergey Egishyants describes the situation with the ruble rate in his weekly review:

The dollar ends the year just as it behaved in the second half of the year - i.e. growing against everything around: the euro fell to 1.21, the yen - to 121, the pound - to 1.55, etc. The ruble is growing, because the Central Bank has squeezed money, and everyone else has bought bucks and sit on them - from time to time they have to sell part of their foreign exchange reserves in order not to go broke and make ruble payments; no one has free rubles - hence the result. The Bank of Russia encourages banks to issue foreign currency loans to corporations — and, on their security, borrow from the Central Bank at a lower percentage: this will help borrowers to pay off their foreign debt successfully. The authorities also urged exporters to sell their surplus accumulations of currency - moreover, the leading state-owned companies were essentially obliged to do this: the reason is that at the end of the year there are usually powerful salaries and bonuses - some of which will inevitably go to buy bucks, they are a little cheaper. But in January the picture will be the opposite - rubles is mute, but necessary. From this it is logical to assume that for the new year the buck will win back slightly (which is already partly happening) - and in January the ruble will take its own; if oil recovers from current prices, the situation will change - and the fluctuations of the authorities' policy cannot be disregarded, because, as the sad experience of this year has shown, they can be decisive.

The head of the Ministry of Finance, Alexei Ulyukayev, estimated the amount of currency bought out by the population at $ 30 billion a year - according to the official, the authorities' task now is to demonstrate to the citizens the stability of the ruble exchange rate over the next few months.

However, difficulties may arise with this - the new week began at the exchange trades with a sharp weakening of the ruble - the euro exchange rate soared to 72 rubles, rising by six rubles at once, and the dollar rose to the level of 59.005. Experts interviewed by RBC stated that the high volatility of exchange rates is to blame for the low volume of pre-holiday trading.

Representatives of the organization of OPEC oil-exporting countries predict that by the end of 2015, oil prices (the drop in which was one of the reasons for the currency crisis in Russia) will increase and will vary between $ 70-80 per barrel. LUKOIL President Vagit Alekperov agrees with this assessment.

Stock markets

At the end of last week, the stabilization of oil prices affected the growth of the MICEX and RTS indices at the opening of trading on Friday - in the first minute of trading on December 26 they added 0.6-0.7% each. By 10:01 Moscow time, the MICEX index was 1,417.15 points (+ 0.6%), the RTS index - 850.1 points (+ 0.7%).

At the same time, the final result of the week was not so optimistic - the weakening of the ruble exchange rate led to the RTS index closing on Friday trading, having lost about 2%, dropping to 828.57 points. The MICEX index managed to maintain a positive trend - by the end of trading on the Moscow Stock Exchange, it grew by 0.66%, to 1,417.80 points.

What to expect next year

From January 1, 2015, several new rules for private investors will take effect in Russia at once. In particular, the law regulating the Forex market will come into force (according to the new rules, the maximum for the use of borrowed funds will be 1 to 50), tax privileges for bank deposits will be introduced and the form for calculating real estate tax will change.

Another important innovation: from January 1, 2015, a new financial product will become available to resident individuals - an individual investment account

An individual investment account (MIS) must be open for a period of at least three years and replenished by no more than 400 thousand rubles. in year. Investors will be able to choose one of the proposed benefits - either once a year to receive a tax deduction for the amount of IIS, but not more than 400 thousand rubles, and to independently issue a refund to the tax inspectorate, or to be exempt from paying taxes on all received arrived.

All future changes are described in detail in the material at the link .

That's all, thank you for your attention. More analytical materials from leading experts on the ITinvest website .