Category Archive: 3) Swiss Markets and News

Main Author Investec

Investec is a distinctive Specialist Bank and Asset Manager. We provide a diverse range of financial products and services to a niche client base in three principal markets, the United Kingdom, South Africa and Australia, as well as certain other geographies. Investec’s strategic goals are motivated by the desire to develop an efficient and integrated business on an international scale through the active pursuit of clearly established core competencies in the group’s principal business areas.

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Seven banks fined in Swiss probes of rate-rigging cartels

2016-12-24

by Investec

2016-12-24

Switzerland handed out about $100 million in antitrust fines against seven U.S. and European banks for participating in cartels to manipulate widely used financial benchmarks.

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Sentiment appears positive as investors close their books for the year

2016-12-23

by Investec

2016-12-23

Ahead of the Christmas break, trading volumes were thin this week amid a lack of new market catalysts. Swiss and European equities were generally unchanged through the week, tracking global stock markets. Overall, sentiment appears to be positive as investors close their books for the year.

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FRIEDMAN: Trump’s Biggest Problem Is Not the Democrats

2016-12-22

by John Mauldin

Download the FREE special report “Top 3 Economic Surprises for 2017” from George Friedman here: http://bit.ly/2ih5W5n

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The hidden cost of Christmas gifts

2016-12-22

by Investec

2016-12-22

If you haven’t had a chance to go Christmas shopping don’t despair, gifts destroy value. For example, someone on a diet is unlikely to place much value on a box of chocolates. The difference between what was paid for the chocolates and what the recipient would have paid represents destroyed value. They could have been left on the shelf for someone who would have fully valued them. Economists call this deadweight loss.

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FRIEDMAN: There’s No Such Thing as Europe Anymore

2016-12-22

by John Mauldin

Download the FREE special report “Top 3 Economic Surprises for 2017” from George Friedman: http://bit.ly/2ih5W5n

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Swiss watch exports poised for worst year since 1984: chart

2016-12-21

by Investec

2016-12-21

The number of watches Switzerland exports is on track to reach the lowest level since 1984, when digital timepieces were in vogue and Swatch Group AG had just been formed in reaction to low-cost competition.

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Police say no terror links to Zurich mosque gunman

2016-12-20

by Swissinfo

2016-12-20

Around 80 people were gathered at the Islamic centre on Monday evening (Keystone)

Police say the man responsible for the shooting incident at the Zurich Islamic Centre on Monday evening was a 24-year-old Swiss with Ghanaian roots. They said there appears to be no link to radical groups. The man's motive for the mosque shooting and a separate murder on Sunday remains unclear.

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Swiss to avoid EU clash as immigration bill passes final hurdle

2016-12-20

by Investec

2016-12-20

After three years of uncertainty, Switzerland may just have solved its immigration dispute with the European Union. Lawmakers in Bern on Friday passed a bill designed to curb EU immigration by giving locals a head start on filling job vacancies. By supporting the measure — which sidesteps quotas — they aim to prevent a deeper dispute that could cost the country crucial trade deals.

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Swiss-based Glencore’s Rosneft deal reopens battle for Russian commodities

2016-12-18

by Investec

2016-12-18

In the cutthroat world of commodities trading, there’s no bigger prize than Russia. The country of Vladimir Putin has it all: oil, natural gas, aluminum, nickel, wheat, coal and many other riches. The world’s biggest trading houses have jostled over it for decades.

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Swiss pay doesn’t always match company success, Ethos says

2016-12-17

by Investec

2016-12-17

Switzerland continues to see a disconnect between executive pay and company performance three years after voters passed some of the world’s strictest limits on compensation, according to a study by corporate governance group Ethos.

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December rally continues this week for SMI

2016-12-16

by Investec

2016-12-16

2016’s December rally continued this week as Swiss and European equities outperformed global stocks. The US dollar continued to surge after the Federal Reserve increased interest rates for only the second time in a decade on Wednesday.

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Swiss fact: Switzerland is one of the world’s top 5 coffee exporters

2016-12-16

by Investec

2016-12-16

According to UN trade statistics, the small Alpine nation exported US$ 2.4 billion1 of coffee in 2013. This figure is far higher than its cheese (US$ 615 million2) or chocolate (US$ 822 million3) exports, two far more famous Swiss exports.

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WTI Crude tumbles To $49 Handle, Erases OPEC/NOPEC Deal Gains

2016-12-15

by Tyler Durden

2016-12-15

But, but, but... growth, and inflation, and supply cuts, and growth again... Well that de-escalated quickly... As Libya restarts exports and The Fed sends the dollar soaring so WTI crude prices just broke back to a $49 handle for the first time since Dec 8th.

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Swiss banks probed at home over Brazil’s ‘Carwash’ bribe scandal

2016-12-14

by Investec

2016-12-14

The Switzerland attorney general’s office is shifting its focus to banks operating in the country as it continues to investigate Brazil’s bribery scandal, after plea deals with individual executives provided fresh insights into how the illicit funds flowed through the financial system.

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Migros Bank could pass on negative interest rates

2016-12-13

by Investec

2016-12-13

Because of negative interest, even a savings account earning 0% interest is earning too much reckons the bank’s boss. Soon many banks will be passing on some of the cost of negative interest to their clients, reports 20 Minutes. Migros Bank will need to seriously consider doing the same in 2017.

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Who Has To Work The Longest To Afford An iPhone?

2016-12-13

by Tyler Durden

2016-12-13

How many hours must you work to buy a new iPhone? It varies dramatically around the world, reflecting disparities in productivity and purchasing power. According to a recent report by UBS that aims to measure well-being by estimating how many minutes workers in various countries must work to afford either an iphone, a Big Mac, a kilo of bread or a kilo of rice, the average worker in Zurich or New York can buy an iPhone 6 in under three working days.

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cash-Talk vom 12. Dezember 2016

2016-12-12

by Cash

Im cash-Talk erklärt Vorsorgespezialist Willy Graf, wie ein frühzeitiger Ruhestand verwirklicht werden kann. Ausserdem warnt er vor zu hohen Einkäufen in die Pensionskasse. Denn mehr ist nicht immer besser.

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Credit Suisse planning more Swiss job cuts

2016-12-11

by Investec

2016-12-11

Credit Suisse Group AG is preparing a new cost-savings program that puts as many as 1,300 jobs in Switzerland on the line, according to Schweiz am Sonntag. The plan will be announced Wednesday, when the lender holds its investor day in London, the newspaper said, without saying where it got the information. Credit Suisse’s Swiss unit may slash an additional 1,000 to 1,300 positions, or about eight to 10 percent of the unit’s workforce, it said.

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Which Of These Would You Rather Have In Your Safe?

2016-12-10

by Simon Black

2016-12-10

Let’s say you have two equal size safety deposit boxes. One box you completely fill up with stacks of $100 bills. The other box you fill up with gold. Which of the two is “worth” more? It’s easy to calculate. A stack of 100x $100 bills is 6.14 inches long, 2.61 inches wide, and 0.43 inches tall. That’s a volume of 6.89 cubic inches (112.92 cubic centimeters… and we’ll use the metric system from here on out because it really does make more...

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Pension payments could become compulsory for self-employed in Switzerland

2016-12-10

by Investec

2016-12-10

Switzerland’s Federal Council is looking at a proposal to make pension payments compulsory for self-employed workers in the same way that they are for salaried workers.

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