Tag Archives: newsletter

© Marlon Trottmann _ Dreamstime.com This week, the Federal Council rejected two very different initiatives aimed at changing the state pension system. In common with much of the developed world, Switzerland is facing a large gap between the money required to fund state pensions and the money flowing in to pay for them, a challenge driven by increasing life expectancy, a rise in the number of pensioners as the population ages and the way the system is funded....

Sergeant Javier Esqueda of the Joliet Police Department in Illinois thought he was doing the right thing by leaking a video recorded from inside of a squad car that showed a black man, Eric Lurry, in medical distress from a drug overdose being slapped and having a police baton forced in his mouth. Lurry later died from the overdose. Sergeant Esqueda received an award from the Lamplighter Project, an advocacy group for police whistleblowers. After an internal affairs...

The new covid variant and quick imposition of travel restrictions on several countries in southern Africa have injected a new dynamic into the mix.  It may take the better part of the next couple of weeks for scientists to get a handle on what the new mutation means and the efficacy of the current vaccination and pill regime.The initial net impact has been to reduce risk, as seen in the sharp sell-off of stocks.  Emerging market currencies extended their losses. ...

An average Swiss household spends more than 14% of its gross income on housing and energy. © Keystone/Christian Beutler The average private household in Switzerland spent about 31% of its income on taxes, social security and health insurance premiums in 2019. That’s 1% up on the previous year, slightly reducing the individual budget and the chances of setting money aside. Latest official figures show that the average gross monthly income was CHF9,582 ($10,301) up...

Do governments hate gold? The answer: Yes — Governments hate gold because they cannot print it, and it is difficult for them to control. Because they cannot print it or easily control it, gold has little use to them during the never-ending schemes to tax and then redistribute wealth. India is a recent example of a government trying to control gold imports through increased taxation on imports and imposing rules, such as that importers had to re-export 20% of imports...

Since the very beginning of the covid panic, the narrative has been this: implement severe lockdowns or your population will experience a bloodbath. Morgues will be overwhelmed, the death total toll will be astounding. On the other hand, we were assured those jurisdictions that do lock down would see only a fraction of the death toll. Then, once vaccines became available, the narrative was modified to “Get shots in arms and then covid will stop spreading. Those...

Overview: Concerns that a new mutation of the Covid virus has shaken the capital markets.  Equities are off hard, and bonds have rallied.  In the foreign exchange market, the Japanese yen and Swiss franc have rallied.  While there may be a safe haven bid, there also appears to be an unwinding of positions that require the buying back of the funding currencies, which is also lifting the euro.  The currencies levered from growth, the dollar-bloc and Scandis are...

25.11.2021 – Switzerland’s settlement and urban areas have expanded by a further 181 km2 in the last ten years, which is twice the area of Lake Zurich. Compared with previous decades, however, settlement growth has slowed down slightly. Forests have also expanded, but only in the mountains. Like settlements, they have grown primarily at the expense of agricultural area. In the high mountain regions, glaciers have continued to shrink unabatedly. These are the latest...

Die Rallye hat sich ein wenig beruhigt. Trotzdem liegt der BTC in der Nähe seines Allzeithochs. Dem Kursanstieg zum Trotz bleiben jedoch die Gebühren auf moderatem Niveau und sanken zuletzt sogar deutlich – woran liegt es? Bitcoin News: Gebühren für Bitcoin sinken trotz Höchstkursen Arcane Research hat festgestellt, dass die Gebühren im Wochenvergleich um 26 Prozent gesunken sind. Dies hat vor allem zwei Gründe: Erstens werden immer mehr Bitcoin-Transaktionen über...

When Japan’s Ministry of Trade, Economy, and Industry (METI) reported earlier in November that Japanese Industrial Production (IP) had plunged again during the month of September 2021, it was so easy to just dismiss the decline as a product of delta COVID. According to these figures, industrial output fell an unsightly 5.4%…from August 2021, meaning month-over-month not year-over-year. Altogether, IP in Japan is down just over 10% since June, nearly 11% since...