MOSCOW, June 7 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's stock market is unlikely this year to keep up the record high growth rates it posted in 2005, the head of the country's financial markets regulator said Wednesday.
After long stagnation, Russia's stock market took off in 2005, growing by almost 82% against just 3.6% in 2004, and passing the symbolic 1,000-points level on the Russian Trading System (RTS) index. In early 2006, the RTS passed 1,500 points, another important benchmark level.
Oleg Vyugin, the head of the Federal Financial Markets Service, said Russian companies could still up their market value further, even though developing economies, including the Russian market, were unlikely in the next few years to develop at recent record rates.
Vyugin said Russia's financial sector needed effective infrastructure to enable companies to make quick settlements or complete initial public offerings within the time limits used at trading floors in developed countries.
He said Russia's GDP has doubled in U.S.-dollar terms in the past five or even four years.
"The Russian economy is a rapidly growing economy for global investors," Vyugin said, adding that Russian blue chips had been previously undervalued.
