MOSCOW, May 24 (Reuters) - The Russian rouble reached its strongest mark against the dollar since late January on Friday, supported by capital controls, state forex sales and high interest rates as the peak of a favourable month-end tax period approached.
By 0932 GMT, the rouble was 0.4% higher at 89.65 to the dollar, earlier reaching 89.5625, its strongest point since Jan. 31.
Against the euro, the rouble rose 0.5% to 97.17, earlier crossing the 97 threshold for the first time since Feb. 5, and gained 0.5% to 12.33 against the yuan .
The rouble tends to gain support from month-end tax payments that usually see exporters convert foreign currency revenues into roubles to meet local liabilities.
"The peak of the tax period is on Tuesday and the supply of foreign currency from exporters could still increase," Bank St Petersburg analysts said in a note.
Capital controls introduced by presidential decree in October 2023 require dozens of undisclosed exporting firms to deposit a high percentage of foreign currency earnings with Russian banks and then sell most of those proceeds on the domestic market. The controls were extended by a year at the end of April.
The state's overall forex sales were sharply increased to 6.3 billion roubles ($70.19 million) a day in May from 0.6 billion roubles a day in the previous month, further buttressing the Russian currency.
After three successive interest rate holds at 16%, the central bank has adopted a more hawkish stance ahead of its next meeting on June 7, with inflation remaining stubbornly high.
Brent crude oil, a global benchmark for Russia's main export, was down 0.8% at $80.71 a barrel.
Russian stock indexes fell. The dollar-denominated RTS index fell 0.4% to 1,185.0. The rouble-based MOEX Russian index lost 0.8% to 3,463.9. ($1 = 89.7625 roubles) (Reporting by Alexander Marrow; Editing by Alison Williams)
