Rouble steadies away from 3-week low vs dollar

• The Russian rouble steadied on Friday away from three-week lows against the dollar hit earlier this week as the market looked for new momentum amid lingering concerns about the global economy.
• Oil prices recovered after a sell-off earlier this week. Brent crude oil, a global benchmark for Russia's main export

MOSCOW: The Russian rouble steadied on Friday away from three-week lows against the dollar hit earlier this week as the market looked for new momentum amid lingering concerns about the global economy.

At 0740 GMT, the rouble was 0.1pc stronger at 65.09 versus the dollar, moving away from its weakest level in three weeks of 65.57 touched briefly on Wednesday.

Against the euro, the rouble was little changed at 71.42 .

Market players were reluctant to take new positions ahead of the weekend and before the publication of U.S. non-farm payroll data for September.

Concerns about downside pressure on the rouble from state foreign currency purchases at home faded after the Russian finance ministry announced only an incremental increase in daily FX buying to 9.2 billion roubles ($141.34 million) in October.

"We think the increase of MinFin's daily purchases will have no material effects on the rouble this month," VTB Capital said in a note, adding that the size of the increase is small relative to the average daily volume of dollar-rouble trades.

Oil prices recovered after a sell-off earlier this week. Brent crude oil, a global benchmark for Russia's main export, was up 0.6pc at $58.05 a barrel.

Russian stock indexes tracked oil prices higher. The dollar-denominated RTS index rose 0.3pc to 1,311.5 points. The rouble-based MOEX Russian index was 0.05pc higher at 2,708.7 points.