The ruble appreciated for a third day against the dollar as reports from the U.S. to Germany yesterday signaled advancing economic growth, spurring demand for riskier assets. The Russian currency gained 0.3 percent to 31.5499 per dollar as of 10:13 a.m. in Moscow, heading for the best closing level since Jan. 12. The ruble was little changed at 40.27 per euro and was steady at 35.4713 against the central bank’s target dollar-euro basket. Oil, Russia’s chief export earner, climbed 0.5 percent to $101.21 per barrel in New York futures trading. A U.S. Federal Reserve report showed manufacturing in the New York region expanded at the fastest pace in nine months. German investor confidence jumped the most on record in January, according to the Mannheim-based ZEW Center for European Economic Research yesterday. Investors pared bets on the ruble weakening further, with non-deliverable forwards showing the Russsian currency at 31.949 per dollar in three months. Russia’s dollar-denominated bonds due in 2018 rose, pushing the yield down nine basis points, or 0.09 percentage point, to 4.153 percent. The Finance Ministry is selling 20 billion rubles of so- called OFZ bonds due June 2015 at a yield between 7.65 percent and 7.7 percent, according to a statement on its website yesterday. The yield on the notes dropped four basis points to 7.68 percent yesterday. OFZs worth 45 billion rubles are due to be repaid today, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. A total 401 billion rubles’ worth are maturing this year, the most since at least 1996, when Bloomberg begain compiling the data. After losing the most since 2008 last year, the ruble has advanced 1.9 percent against the dollar in 2012. That compares with a gain of 4.5 percent for Brazil’s real, a rise of 4.9 percent for India’s rupee and a drop of 0.3 percent for the Chinese yuan. To contact the reporter on this story: Jack Jordan in Moscow at jjordan22@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Gavin Serkin at gserkin@bloomberg.net

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