SNB & CHF

The SNB made a profit of around CHF40 billion from its foreign currency positions and a valuation gain of CHF6.9 billion on its gold holdings (Keystone) The Swiss National Bank (SNB) expects to post an annual profit of CHF49 billion ($50.29 billion) for 2019, it said on Thursday, citing big gains from foreign bonds and stocks bought to dampen the value of the safe-haven Swiss franc. The profit, following a loss of CHF15 billion in 2018, means the central bank will...

Die Schweizerische Nationalbank (SNB) hat gemäss provisorischen Berechnungen im Geschäftsjahr 2019 einen Gewinn von rund 49 Milliarden Franken erzielt. Der Löwenanteil des Gewinns entfiel mit 40 Milliarden auf die Fremdwährungspositionen. Auf dem Goldbestand resultierte derweil ein Bewertungsgewinn von 6,9 Milliarden, und der Erfolg auf den Frankenpositionen (mehrheitlich Negativzinsen) belief sich auf rund 2 Milliarden Franken. Die Zuweisung an die Rückstellungen...

When I write that there are no winners around the world, what I mean is more comprehensive than just the trade wars. On that one narrow account, of course there are winners and losers. The Chinese are big losers, as the Census Bureau numbers plainly show (as well as China’s own). But even the winners of the trade wars find themselves wondering where all the spoils are. They may be winners because of it but somehow they all still end up in the losing column. Late...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.27% to 1.079 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, January 8(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: The Iranian retaliatory missile strike on Iraqi-bases housing US forces initially sparked a dramatic risk-off response throughout the capital markets. The muted response by the US coupled with signals from Tehran that it had “concluded” its proportionate measures saw the markets...

USD/CHF recovers amid the recent risk reset. 200-bar SMA adds to the upside barrier, 2019 low holds the key to further declines. USD/CHF bounces off the intra-day low of 0.9665 to 0.9702 while heading into the European session on Wednesday. The pair benefits from the absence of immediate US-Iran war after Tehran hit US bases in Iraq. Even so, the pair stays well below the descending trend line since November 29, at 0.9730, which limits the near-term advances. Should...

Access to home ownership became more expensive. (© Keystone / Ennio Leanza) Rents in Switzerland fell by an average of 0.5% last year but some regions bucked the trend. Last year was a good one for tenants, according to the Swiss Real Estate Offer Indexexternal link, which was published on Tuesday. December alone saw rents dropping 0.4% on average. The most significant drops were in central Switzerland (-1.7%), the Lake Geneva region (-1.1%) and northwestern...

Auto sales in 2019 ended on a skid. Still, the year as a whole wasn’t nearly as bad as many had feared. Last year got off on the wrong foot in the aftermath of 2018’s landmine, with auto sales like consumer spending down pretty sharply to begin it. Spending did rebound in mid-year if only somewhat, enough, though, to add a little more to the worst-is-behind-us narrative which finished off 2019. That’s the version that is being described, Jay Powell’s underlying...

First it was Dennis Gartman shutting down his newsletter after more than three decades, lamenting a market that no longer made any sense (a lament shared by Deutsche Bank’s Aleksanda Kocic), and now the market’s QE4-driven meltup has forced Wall Street’s biggest sellside bear to capitulate on his November call that the market will drop in 2020; instead UBS’ head of US equity strategy, Francois Trahan, has joined the bullish herd hiking his year-end S&P price...

◆ Gold could rise to more than $7,000 an ounce according to respected MoneyWeek contributor and fund manager Charlie Morris (Part I today and Part II tomorrow) A year ago, in my occasional free newsletter, Atlas Pulse, I upgraded gold – which was trading at $1,239 an ounce at that point – to “bull market” status for the first time since 2012. Unlike the gold bugs, I’m not a broken record. And unlike the barbarous relic brigade, I recognise gold’s importance in the...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.10% to 1.0827 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, January 7(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: Without fresh escalation, investors cannot maintain a heightened sense of geopolitical anxiety. The recovery of US shares yesterday set the tone for today’s rebound in Asia and Europe. All the equity markets in the Asia Pacific region rallied today, led by a 1.6% rally in Japan and a...