Page 20 - RusRPTDec20

The number of individual investment accounts (IIA) for the year from September 2019 to September 2020 increased two and a half times and reached 2.9mn, and 525,000 of them were opened in the third quarter, reports the CBR.
In October 2020, the Moscow Exchange recorded new historical records in the stock market:
MOEX has also reported record numbers of new clients this year, with adding 736,000 year to date as of October as well as record volumes of transactions with more than 1.2mn customers making at least one transactions with shares.
The exchange is trying to keep up with demand from these retail investors and in August launched the possibility to buy foreign listed companies via the MOEX exchange, which is possible since Russia was hooked up to international settlements and payment system Clearstream n 2012. By the beginning of November the daily turnover in trading foreign-listed stocks was up to RUB1.5bn ($20mn). Private investors now account for 43% of the volume of all trading on the stock market, up from 34% in 2019, and 45.8% of trading in foreign shares.
The authorities have long tried to encourage the average Russian to invest in order to create a new source of capital, but each attempt in the past has been met with disaster.
In 1996 then president Boris Yeltsin launched the so-called PIFs (mutual investment funds) and several international companies like Franklin Templeton moved in hoping to reap profits from an investment bonanza. Except within 18 months the market crashed in the 1998 crisis.
20 ​RUSSIA Country Report​ December 2020 www.intellinews.com