As the new year kicked off, the Russian ruble has appeared to be quite steady – despite the long awaited signing of the trade deal between the United States and China. The world’s two greatest economies finally signed a Phase 1 trade agreement on January 15, which finished an 18-month period of negotiations and potentially put aside trading tension. However, US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said that the Trump administration still thinks about keeping the tariffs imposed on Chinese goods until after the November elections. That, in turn, can hamper emerging currencies by limiting global economic risk.
At 08:14 GMT on Friday, Russian ruble reached its highest point since April 2018 and stayed at 61.45 RUBUTSTN=MCX. That was flat in comparison to the euro EURRUBTN=MCX, trading at 68.36.
Gazprombank’s spokespeople are convinced that there is still some room for further strengthening of ruble. Therefore, they expect the Russian currency to move beyond 59 per USD in the first six months of 2020.
Notably, Brent crude oil LCOc1 was down 0.4% at $64.2 a barrel, which is also important for Russia as it is a global benchmark for Russia’s main export.
Yields on Russia’s 10-year treasury bond had grown to 6.23%, which showed a great increase in comparison to a 14-year low of 6.07% reached a week ago.
By Natalia Revishvili, ForexNewsNow.com