For Russian equities guide see For Russian treasury bonds see (Reporting by Jake Cordell Editing by Kim Coghill, Emelia Sithole-Matarise, Peter Graff)
(Recasts, updates prices)
By Jake Cordell
Feb 3 (Reuters) - The Russian rouble fell back against
the U.S. dollar in trading on Friday as the finance ministry
said it would sell $2.3 billion worth of foreign currency in the
month ahead to help plug a deficit in the state budget.
The rouble was 0.3% lower against the U.S. dollar at 70.68
at 1430 GMT , but rose against other currencies.
It climbed 0.6% against the euro to 76.72 and was
up 0.2% against the Chinese yuan to 10.43 .
Russia's finance ministry said it would sell 8.9 billion
roubles ($126.6 million) worth of foreign currency per day
between Feb. 7 and March 6, an almost three-fold increase on
daily interventions in the previous month.
Total interventions during the period will amount to 160.2
billion roubles ($2.28 billion), it said, more than double the
79.75 billion roubles expected by analysts in a Reuters poll.
However, weak oil and gas revenues - which came in at their
lowest monthly level since August 2020 - have raised the
prospect of Russia falling deeper into a budget deficit in the
months ahead.
Russia sells down its foreign currency reserves to reduce
the rouble's volatility to global energy prices and to fill gaps
in the state budget.
The sales are likely to be conducted in Chinese yuan, which
has become a vital currency instrument for the Russian
government and companies in the face of sanctions banning access
to Western financial markets.
Geopolitics and energy also remained in focus, with the next
stage of the European Union's price cap on Russia's oil exports
- including premium refined products such as diesel - set to
come into force from Feb. 5.
Russian stock indexes fell.
The dollar-denominated RTS index was down 0.2% at
1,002.3 points and the rouble-based MOEX Russian index was up 0.2% to 2,247.1 points.
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