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Trump and Sanders have whipped up a lot of popular support by opposing “free trade” agreements. But it’s not just politics and populism … mainstream experts are starting to reconsider their blind adherence to the dogma that more globalization and bigger free trade agreement are always good. UC Berkeley Economics professor Robert Reich – Bill Clinton’s Secretary of Labor – wrote last month: Suppose that by enacting a particular law we’d...

Investec Switzerland. The SMI is set to finish flat this week (-0.12%), outperforming global equity market (MSCI World -0.68% ) with European stocks losing value after the long awaited ECB policy meeting. Stock markets around the world were mixed with risk appetite increasing ahead of Thursday’s European Central Bank (ECB) policy meeting and falling thereafter. The ECB lowered all its main interest rates and expanded its quantitative-easing purchase plan quantity (by €20...

After nearly ten years of European Union (EU) opposition to certain controversial Swiss tax structures, Switzerland’s government agreed a deal in 2014 to do away with such arrangements. Under current rules Swiss cantons can offer preferential tax rates to certain companies, mostly multinationals with most of their activity abroad. This is now changing. What are preferential tax deals? They are special low tax deals Swiss cantons offer only to specific companies. In the canton of Vaud, the...

Swiss resident companies and individuals applied for more patents than those in the UK in 2015. The European patent office’s recently released annual report, shows there were 7,088 Swiss-based european patent applications compared to the UK’s 5,037. On the face of it these numbers are not too far apart. On a per capita basis there is a more than tenfold difference. Switzerland filed 873 european patents per million residents. The UK filed 79. In addition, Switzerland is well ahead of its...

Last year the Swiss government decided to increase the fees train operators, including Swiss Rail, must pay to run their trains on Switzerland’s rail network. © Hai Huy Ton That | Dreamstime.com Switzerland has 4,641 km of track running as high as 3,454 metres, and one of the densest rail networks in the world. Maintaining all of this track costs a lot of money, and some of it comes from train operators, that pay to use certain sections of track at specified times. The system works in much...

Investec Switzerland. The SMI is set to close higher this week but lagging behind gains of global equity markets after heavyweight Roche fell almost 5% on Thursday after paying its dividend. © Blopatic | Dreamstime.com Stock markets around the world extended their rally this week, continuing to benefit from substantial gains in the price of crude oil after data showed declines in American oil production. Risk appetite also increased this week as investors begin to...

Le Matin. The National council thinks shops should stay open until 8pm across all of Switzerland. 115 members against 68 would like to see shop opening hours harmonised across the country. The proposal would mean that retailers across Switzerland would be allowed to open from 6am until 8pm from Monday to Friday and from 6am until 6pm on Saturdays. Public holidays would be exempted and cantons would be able to opt for longer opening hours if they chose to. A fight against cross-border...

20 Minutes. Geneva’s Ensemble à gauche and Socialist parties want to see compulsory dental care and presented a proposal to Geneva’s parliament in mid-February. On Monday Geneva’s labour party (Parti du travail) launched a cantonal initiative for the same thing. © Nejron | Dreamstime.com The plan would be funded by compulsory salary deductions of 1%. Half of this would be categorised as a payment by employers and half by employees. In many cases the full 1% would eventually be born by...

Investec Switzerland. The Swiss economy returned to growth at the end of last year as it fought off the impact of a currency shock that had threatened to push the country into a recession. Gross domestic product rose 0.4 percent in the three months through December, after contracting 0.1 percent in the prior quarter, the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs in Bern said on Wednesday. That’s the strongest quarter in a year and beats the median economist estimate for a 0.1...

    Hold your real assets outside of the banking system in a private international facility  -->  http://www.321gold.com/info/053015_sprott.html        USA: The New Switzerland? Written by Jeff Thomas (CLICK FOR ORIGINAL)            At one time, tax havens took great pride in calling themselves just that, since low-tax jurisdictions provide people with freedom from oppressive taxation. But, in recent decades, the...