The dollar-based RTS index was up 0.4 percent at 0930 GMT, having risen 3 per cent during the first week of the year, while the rouble-based MICEX gained by the same amount. The rouble trod a similar path, trading 0.4 percent higher against the dollar at 31.86, while losing 0.1 percent against the euro. Russian markets are open for the extended January public holiday for the first time as the government strives to create an international financial centre that can lure more capital from overseas investors. The move has been justified by early year stocks gains that out-performed the MSCI emerging market index, which gained 1.2 percent last week. "The driver of the market (has been) the large inflow of Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) investment money, especially from US-based investors, playing Russia as an oil proxy," Troika Dialog analyst Chris Weafer said in a note. In the absence of any domestic macroeconomic or corporate news, investors have been following external factors such as developments in the euro zone crisis and a steadily rising oil price -- boosted by tension in the Middle East. Brent crude was trading 0.4 percent higher on Monday at $113.5 a barrel. "We start the new year as we ended the old, with investors in Russia primarily focusing on events in Brussels, Berlin, Washington and Beijing," Weafer said. "That is likely to remain the case for the next couple of months as we await clarity from the euro zone and the end of the election season. After the presidential election we may start to talk about a domestic story," he added. Russia experienced the biggest street protests since the fall of the Soviet Union last month as demonstrators took to the streets to demand fair elections and an end to the rule of Vladimir Putin, who runs to return to the Kremlin in March. Investors have been spooked by the unrest and are awaiting news on the make-up of a new government and a new reform agenda. The rouble lost 5.2 percent of its value against the dollar in 2011 -- its worst result since 2008 -- while the RTS shed 22 percent to wipe out the gains of 2010.