Tag Archives: newsletter

It was a tense exchange. When even politicians can sense that there’s trouble brewing, there really is trouble brewing. Typically the last to figure these things out, if parliamentarians are up in arms it already isn’t good, to put it mildly. Well, not quite the last to know, there are always central bankers faithfully pulling up the rear of recognizing disappointing reality. At the end of November, Mario Draghi went...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.08% at 1.14 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, January 31(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: The Fed’s dovish tone and earnings news are the main drivers of the capital markets today, helping lift stocks, bonds, and currencies. Large equity markets in Asia, including Japan, Hong Kong, China’s CSI 300, India, and Indonesia, all...

Prospects for French economic growth are looking up, but disruptions to consumption are possible. French GDP rose by 0.3% quarter-on-quarter (q-o-q) in Q4, the same pace as in Q3. The details reveal that Q4 exports surged significantly, while household consumption and investment slowed. This left growth for the year at +1.5%, following +2.3% in 2017. The breakdown of GDP data show that household consumption growth...

© Industryviews Dreamstime.com - Click to enlarge Either at work, at a restaurant, on public transport or in a shop, nearly half of Swiss admit to stealing, according to a survey by moneyland.ch 49% of the 1,500 questioned in the survey admitted to pocketing something without paying. Young people admitted to being the most light fingered. Around a fifth of those aged 18-25 had taken something from the supermarket...

The social media space is absolutely ripe for a new entrant who demands arduous verification and constantly monitors its user base to eliminate cloned and fake accounts. How many accounts on Facebook are fake? Recent estimates of half could be low. Here’s an experiment: open a Facebook account with a name that cannot possibly be anyone else’s real name, for example, Johns XQR Citizenry. Solicit a few real people to...

The state-owned Swiss telecoms operator has branched out into blockchain technology. Daniel Haudenschild has stepped down as Chief Executive Officer of Swisscom Blockchain with immediate effect. The state-owned telecommunications group gave no reason for the shock move by the top manager and shareholder of its blockchain advisory unit. News of Haudenshild’s departure clearly came out of the blue for the Swiss blockchain...

Swiss Franc The Euro has risen by 0.27% at 1.1396 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, January 30(see more posts on EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: The UK Prime Minister has two weeks to strike a new deal with the EC over the Irish backstop or return to Parliament in mid-February to consider alternatives, six weeks before Brexit.  Sterling has recovered about half of...

Swiss watch exports grew by 6.3% in 2018, breaking the CHF21 billion ($21.2 billion) mark. This increase, largely due to Asian markets, is set to continue this year despite uncertainty surrounding the Chinese economy. Swiss watchmakers are cautiously optimistic despite global political and economic uncertainty - Click to enlarge Exports to Hong Kong shot up by 19.1% (to CHF3 billion francs) and to China by 11.7% (to...

Novartis imports some 120 million packs of medicines into the UK each year. - Click to enlarge Swiss pharmaceuticals giant Novartis says a no-deal Brexit could hurt patients and that it is stockpiling medicines in the UK to help ensure continuity of supply. In a press releaseexternal link on Friday, it said that after the British parliament’s rejection of Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit deal, “the risk of UK...

Wealth is flowing to those who earn money from their human capital and enterprise. So you want to get rich: OK, what’s the plan? If you ask youngsters how to get rich, many will respond by listing the professions the media focuses on: entertainment, actors/actresses, pro athletes, and maybe a few lionized inventors or CEOs. The media’s glorification of the few at the top of these sectors masks the statistical reality...