Tag Archives: 3.) Swiss Info

Switzerland’s second largest bank is replacing bricks and mortar with digital. Credit Suisse Credit Suisse is taking on so-called challenger banks with a new digital service for customers, including a debit card with no foreign transaction fees. The bank is closing down branches across Switzerland and is converting others into a “digital bar” concept. Switzerland’s second largest bank unveiled its new CSX banking app on Thursday with specific features aimed towards...

Many employees were put on short time work during the lockdown as companies were hit by the pandemic. Keystone / Magali Girardin Government credits and employment support measures have helped stave off a wave of bankruptcies, but they could rise over the longer term, says a survey. Between January and August 2020, which includes the lockdown period, 2,800 firms in Switzerland declared bankruptcy. This is actually 621 fewer than in the same period last year, says the...

Switzerland and Britain are talking of closer cooperation as two major economies that are not part of the EU. © Keystone / Peter Schneider Switzerland and Britain are thrashing out a post-Brexit financial services treaty that is being billed as a global standard for common sense. It also takes aim at perceived EU inflexibility that has seen the Swiss stock market frozen out of European markets. The proposed treaty to “deepen cooperation” on a whole range of financial...

Bricks and mortar is being replaced by digital code in the banking sector. © Keystone / Christian Beutler Swiss lender Credit Suisse is set to launch an overhaul of its digital banking offering, as it uses the coronavirus crisis as a springboard to accelerate the push from bricks-and-mortar branches to online services. Last month the bank confirmed plans to close a quarter of its 146 domestic branches by the end of the year. This would lead to SFr100m ($108m) of...

Valcambi says it is cooperating with NGOs in Peru (picture shows an area in the Madre de Dios province) to improve the working conditions of artisanal miners. Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. The Swiss-based Valcambi refinery has rejected accusations about gold dealings with a controversial company in the United Arab Emirates. Chief executive Michael Mesaric said the claims by the non-governmental Swissaid organisation were unfounded. In a...

Mexico has recorded 634,023 coronavirus infections and 67,558 confirmed deaths, the world’s fourth highest death toll. Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. People arriving in Switzerland from Belgium, Mexico and Luxembourg will no longer have to go into quarantine for ten days. The Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH) on Monday updated its list of countries deemed to have a high risk of coronavirus infection and removed Belgium, Mexico,...

Human rights activists have called on Apple to cut ties with suppliers alleged to be using the forced labour of thousands of ethnic Uighurs in Chinese factories. Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. Campaigners are urging the Swiss government to renegotiate a six-year-old free trade agreement with China to try to improve human rights and labour conditions for its Uighur Muslim minority. On Monday, the Society for Threatened Peoples, the Swiss...

Simonetta Sommaruga opening the Ceneri Base Tunnel on Friday Keystone The Ceneri Base Tunnel has been officially opened, with the first freight train passing through the tunnel in the southern Swiss canton of Ticino shortly after 11:30am. Passengers will have to wait for the new national rail timetable in December. “As a child I spent almost all of my holidays in Ticino […] the journey over the mountain, the Monte Ceneri, seemed to take an age,” Simonetta Sommaruga,...

After appointing an auditor last December, FINMA decided to open so-called enforcement proceedings. © Keystone/Lukas Lehmann The Swiss financial supervisor FINMA says it has opened enforcement proceedings against Credit Suisse into the 2019 spying affair that toppled the bank’s leadership and tarnished its reputation. FINMA opened the proceedings after an auditor appointed last December completed its investigation of Credit Suisse, which has acknowledged...

More than half of new vehicles registered in Switzerland are 4x4s. Keystone / Gaetan Bally The Swiss government is easing the pressure on the automotive industry to reduce CO2 emissions, reports Sunday newspaper Le Matin Dimanche. In its revision of the CO2 ordinance to mitigate global warming, the government had agreed to lower the limit on CO2 emissions to 95g/km from 2020. However, this year car importers can exclude 15% of the most polluting vehicles from their...