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‘Friendly’ Trump positive for Russia investments as ‘hawks’ diminish: CFO of Moscow Exchange
The election of Donald Trump as U.S. president may change attitudes to investing in Russia, the chief financial officer of the Moscow Exchange told CNBC on Tuesday.
"I think a change in the (U.S.) administration may just decrease the number of anti-Russia hawks in Washington and I think just that change may change the perception towards the Russian market," Evgeny Fetisov, chief financial officer at the Moscow Exchange, said.
Fetisov told CNBC that the U.S. - Russian relationship hit a "low point" purely based on a "poor perception" of Russia.
Trump's election and his "friendly" rhetoric towards Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin , should reduce some concerns over Russia's opaque politics, leading to further investments.
Fetisov believes that the Russian bond market is the best option in the near term but investment in equities should also pick up throughout 2017.
"We're very optimistic towards both the bond market and equities market for the coming year," he told CNBC. "Bonds will be growing and equities will follow in a few months."
"If I just set politics aside for a minute, I would be thinking about the interest rates, which are now going down for Russia," he said.
Apart from lower interest rates, inflation is set to contract too. "I am fairly confident we will see 4 percent (year on year inflation) in a year's time which will be the record for modern Russia," he explained.
The Russian economy has been hit by low oil prices and western sanctions and is set to contract 0.6 percent this year, according to data from the International Monetary Fund.
However, the Washington-based institution said late November that the Russian economy has managed to absorb such shocks and there were "signs of a nascent turnaround".
"I'm personally very surprised investors have not taken Russian government bonds at that high yields and that interest rates, " Fetisov added.
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