Market Buzz: Growing post-holiday optimism ‘bearing’ out

Many analysts are positive that the post-holiday bullish trend will be maintained on the Russian market this week.

“Unless there is no terrible news coming from Europe [or] bad statistics from [the] States, then Russia will probably continue to do nicely. I think there will be temptations for Western finance managers and Russians coming back from holyday to actually build up positions, so I would say the market would be high”, says Maksim Shashenkov from UralSib Capital.Last week trades on the Russian market closed slightly lower, but analysts explain the trend by the traders’ desire to close positions before the weekend. Elza Bichurkina from IFC Solid believes the other reason for the Friday trend is Monday’s Martin Luther King Day celebration, when US trades are closed.On Friday the MICEX closed at 1461.75 losing0.19%, and the RTS showed 0.81% downfall, settling at 1446.46 points. Regarding global prospects, Oleg Dushin from Zerich Capital Management points out the new week will present a significant amount of statistical data. Hence, in anticipation of the statistics, one can expect stocks indices growth. Citi, Wells Fargo, GS, BofA и Morgan Stanley reports will be published this week. Analyst thinks most of the data will be positive and will provide support the market.On Friday The Dow Jones saw a 0.39% decrease in trading at 12422.06 points and the NASDAQ lost 0.51%, trading at 2710.67 points. S&P 500 shed 0.49% trading at 1289.09 points.Lasts week’s downgrade of nine EU countries’ credit rating was no surprise, but it has also seriously affected markets outside the region. Asian markets fell on Monday after a range of downgrades from S&P and ongoing debt talks in Greece. Japan’s Nikkei Stock Average and South Korea’s Kospi each fell 1.5%, meanwhile Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 index lost 1.1%.Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index dropped 1% and China’s Shanghai Composite declined 0.6%.