Tag Archives: Swiss Markets and News

As much as a third of this year's Swiss apple crop may have been damaged in a late April frost - Click to enlargeAn unusual end-of-April frost is expected to cost Swiss fruit producers some CHF100 million ($102 million) in damages and as much as three-quarters of their crop this year. “We are talking about historic crop losses,” said Hubert Zufferey of the Swiss fruit growers’ association on Wednesday. Switzerland’s...

© Andrey Popov – Dreamstime.com 20 Minutes. A recent article in the newspaper 20 Minutes highlights the nasty surprise some young people experience when their parents fail to pay their health insurance premiums. Turning 18 is one of life’s key milestones. It corresponds with the end of school and entry into a new world. In Switzerland it is also a health insurance milestone. Switzerland’s system of compulsory basic...

© Irakite | Dreamstime.com Ahead of the automatic exchange of bank account information, which comes into effect at the beginning of next year, Swiss residents with undeclared foreign bank accounts are rushing to come clean to the tax authorities, according to Swiss broadcaster RTS. According to RTS, 380 have come forward in Fribourg, 173 in Valais, 254 in Jura, around 2,000 in Neuchâtel and 4,000 in Geneva. The canton...

Speed and coverage of mobile telecoms is well above average in Switzerland. - Click to enlarge Speed, availability, network responsiveness: on all counts, the mobile experience in Switzerland is “an excellent one”, according to a new report. But improvements could still be made to advance on the leader board. This is the verdict published Wednesday May 24 by OpenSignal, a London-based private held company that issues...

The Swiss spend three hours more per week on average at the office than other Europeans, but working conditions are still good. (Keystone) While the overall health and well-being of Swiss employees is still good, a new survey shows that Switzerland has lost its place ahead of 34 other European countries when it comes to stress and autonomy in the workplace. In 2005, survey answers from Swiss employees on their working...

Jenisch has driven performance under difficult circumstances at Sika - Click to enlarge The markets have welcomed Lafarge Holcim’s choice of chief executive to guide the company out of a reputational hole. Jan Jenisch, who will take over in October, has experienced difficult situations having spent the last two and a half years driving up Sika’s results against the backdrop of a shareholder civil war. Investors...

Central Zurich – © Andreas Zerndl | Dreamstime.com It is widely believed that as the price of real estate climbs those on low incomes are forced out of city centres. A study by the University of Geneva, commissioned by the Swiss Federal Statistical Office focused on the period between 2010 and 2014, shows this is not true in Switzerland. Rich leaving the centres Those earning the most were the most likely to move and...

Members of the public visit the Geneva University Hospitals during an open day in its new Gustave Julliard building (Keystone) Switzerland has been rated third in a global ranking of the access to and the quality of healthcare systems – a report that shows large gaps between the best and worst ranked countries.​​​​​​​ The survey, published online on Thursday in the medical journal The Lancetexternal link, looked at...

Some 202,000 passengers pass through Bern's train station during the week - Click to enlarge Bern railway station, Switzerland’s second busiest after Zurich, is set to expand with the creation of a new underground rail station serving regional trains between Bern and Solothurn. A pedestrian access area is also planned. Some 202,000 passengers pass through Bern’s main train station – the second largest in Switzerland –...

© Lisavan | Dreamstime.com A recent report classifies 570,000 people in Switzerland as poor. This number represents 7% of the population, and relates to 2015. In 2014, the same percentage was 6.6%. The report, which looks only at income, defines as poor a single person with income less than CHF 2,239 per month or a family of four with income below CHF 3,984 per month. Data from the survey of 7,500 households, around...