SNB & CHF

Luxury watches are an important status symbol in China, as in many other parts of the world. - Click to enlarge The Sino-Swiss free trade agreement (FTA) is having only a limited effect on the fight against fake watches, according to a Swiss official. Steps taken by Beijing to counter fraud are often not being enforced by courts. Speaking to Swiss public broadcaster SRF, deputy director of the Swiss Federal Institute...

via Marketwatch: Gold futures settled above $1,300 an ounce on Friday, with prices for the yellow metal at their highest since June as the U.S. dollar pulled back and investors eyed geopolitical turmoil and global growth worries. Rising gold prices reflect “political uncertainty” in the U.S., Eurozone, Venezuela and pockets of South America, as well as China-U.S. trade talks, said George Gero, managing director in RBC....

Newly elected Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recently said that Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) absolutely needed to be “a larger part of our conversation.” Her comment shines a spotlight on MMT. So what is it? According to Wikipedia, it is: “a macroeconomic theory that describes the currency as a public monopoly and unemployment as the evidence that a currency monopolist is restricting the supply of the financial...

Swiss Franc The Euro has risen by 0.05% at 1.1331 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, January 28(see more posts on EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: The global capital markets are consolidating ahead of this week’s big events, which include the FOMC meeting, US jobs, an important Brexit vote in the UK parliament and the first look at Q4 EMU and US GDP. The US dollar is narrowly...

Eurozone Last week the focus was on Europe. Prospects of a delay in Brexit helped extend sterling’s gains to 11-week highs. Disappointing flash PMI for the eurozone and a dovish Draghi pushed the euro below $1.13 for the first time since mid-December. Speculation that the Reserve Bank of Australia would be forced to cut interest rates saw the Australian dollar punch through $0.7100. For its part, the yen was...

Switzerland with its Gotthard tunnel is a major transit country for goods vehicles travelling between northern and southern Europe. Swiss President and Finance Minister Ueli Maurer has signed two agreements with the UK as part of the government’s strategy to maintain smooth ties after Brexit. The agreements on road transport and non-life insurance were signed with UK Chancellor Philip Hammond at the World Economic Forum...

Rising income inequality may be a reflection of the changing nature of work. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s story The Rich Boy included this famous line: “Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.” According to a recent paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER),Capitalists in the Twenty-First Century (abstract only), the “working rich” are different from you and me, and...

A worker assembles a coffee grinder at Schaetti, the holding company of Olympia Express, in Schwanden, Switzerland Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Switzerland are optimistic about export business at the start of 2019, a new survey has found, with over half expecting foreign sales to grow during the year. “The export climate will remain favourable for Swiss SMEs in 2019,” wrote the authors of a Switzerland...

A Return To Normalcy In the first two years after a newly elected President takes office he enacts a major tax cut that primarily benefits the wealthy and significantly raises tariffs on imports. His foreign policy is erratic but generally pulls the country back from foreign commitments. He also works to reduce immigration and roll back regulations enacted by his predecessor. This President is widely rumored to have...

The inspiration behind the school strike movement that’s bringing young people onto the streets all over Europe, has arrived in Switzerland. Greta Thunberg, who’s 16, got there the eco-friendly way and is planning to get her message across at the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos. --- swissinfo.ch is the international branch of the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation (SBC). Its role is to report on Switzerland and to provide a Swiss perspective on international events. For more...