Russian Investor Statistics - Modest Inflows, Big Reshuffle

Moscow Exchange has published retail investor statistics for March. Local retail investors bought R14.6 bln ($190 mln) worth of Russian stocks, which looks quite modest compared to recent months.Local mutual funds registered comparable inflows. Total inflows amounted to R31 bln in March, with nearly half of this going into equities. This brought total inflows from local investors to $400 mln. On the supply side, March saw one IPO and one SPO, worth a combined $2 bln. Foreign investors made up the difference, bringing $1.6 bln into the Russian equity market.The number of individual brokerage accounts continued to grow at a breakneck pace. Some 754k brokerage accounts were opened in March, bringing the total number to more than 11 mln.Stock-level data indicates that retail investor portfolios underwent a significant reshuffle last month. Nornickel's volatility was the event of the month for retail investors, and they massively increased their exposure to the stock, making it their largest holding. Nornickel's share in the portfolio of top 10 stocks climbed from 14.8% to 19.1%. To finance this trade, retail investors sold Lukoil, Gazprom and Sber, whose weights in this indicative portfolio fell by a respective 2.5 pp, 2.0 pp and 1.0 pp. On a separate note, MTS returned to the top 10, displacing Mail.ru Group.