Tag Archive: Business

Payerne Airport Finally Starts to take off

After years of negotiations, Payerne’s regional civilian airport and future business aviation hub is starting to take shape. The first stone of an airport building in northwest Switzerland has been laid. “It’s a day of celebration and joy,” Fribourg businessman Damien Piller told reporters at a ceremony to mark the start of construction of the main airport building on Monday. Work should last 18 months.

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Stories making the Swiss Sunday papers

A wide range of topics occupied Swiss newspapers this weekend, from Swiss investments in US arms companies and requirements for FIFA World Cup host countries, to what to do in the event of a terror attack. A critique of Geneva’s relationship with the Red Cross also made headlines.

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Swiss Asset Manager Settles US Tax Evasion Charges

The Geneva asset management firm Prime Partners has agreed to pay $5 million (CHF4.8 million) to the United States to settle charges for tax evasion and assisting US taxpayers in opening and maintaining undeclared foreign bank accounts from 2001 to 2010.

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Buy Gold Urges Dalio on Linkedin – “Militaristic Leaders Playing Chicken Risks Hellacious War”

Don't let "traditional biases" stop you from diversifying into gold - Dalio on Linkedin. “Risks are now rising and do not appear appropriately priced in” warns founder of world's largest hedge fund. Geo-political risk from North Korea & "risk of hellacious war". Risk that U.S. debt ceiling not raised; technical US default. Safe haven gold likely to benefit by more than dollar, treasuries.

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Passengers may pay price for Air Berlin strife

Airline passengers in Switzerland are bracing themselves for a hike in prices for flights to Germany following the insolvency of budget carrier Air Berlin. The airline had been running at a loss for several years, prompting owner Etihad to pull the plug on Tuesday.

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Jumbolinos Wheeled out to Pasture

Swiss International Air Lines has for the last time flown passengers in an Avro RJ100, fondly called a Jumbolino by many pilots, flight attendants and passengers. The full plane, which flew from London to Zurich on Monday night, carried 81 passengers.

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Indian arms dealer’s Swiss accounts under scrutiny

Swiss authorities have received requests for information concerning possible Swiss bank accounts of Indian defence deals broker Sanjay Bhandari. He is under investigation for allegedly helping Swiss firm Pilatus secure an order for 75 training aircraft for the Indian Air Force in 2012.

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The Secret History Of The Banking Crisis

Accounts of the financial crisis leave out the story of the secretive deals between banks that kept the show on the road. How long can the system be propped up for? It is a decade since the first tremors of what would become the Great Financial Crisis began to convulse global markets. Across the world from China and South Korea, to Ukraine, Greece, Brexit Britain and Trump’s America it has shaken our economy, our society and latterly our politics.

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Swiss rank second in Europe for online spending

According to a European comparison, Swiss residents spend the second-most money annually on online purchases, after British shoppers. Each year, people in Switzerland click their way to an average of CHF1,172 ($1,202) in online goods per person. Shoppers in Britain topped the list with CHF1,280 in online purchases, with Norwegians coming in third at CHF1,053 per year.

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UberPop service cancelled in Zurich

Car-and-driver provider Uber has decided to drop its UberPop service in Zurich following controversy over its legality. The change does not apply to Basel or Geneva. The change takes effect on Thursday at midday. Zurich UberPop drivers will have three months to get permits that will allow them to chauffeur passengers for pay under the more expensive UberX and UberBlack services.

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“Mystery” Central Bank Buyer Revealed: SNB Now Owns A Record $84 Billion In US Stocks

In the second quarter of the year, one in which unlike in Q1 fund flows showed a persistent and perplexing outflow from US stocks and into European and Emerging Markets, a trading desk rumor emerged that even as institutional traders dumped stocks and retail investors piled into ETFs, a "mystery" central bank was quietly bidding up risk assets by aggressively buying stocks.

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Would you take a pilotless plane?

Pilotless cargo and passenger planes could be in use within eight years and save airlines billions, according to a report by Swiss bank UBS. But customers remain wary of the new technology despite potential fare reductions. “In the not-too-distant future, we would expect to see a situation where flights are pilotless or the number of pilots shrinks to one, with a remote pilot based on the ground and highly-secure ground-to-air communications,” the...

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Risk Off: Global Stocks Slide As “Fire And Fury” Results In “Selling And Fear”

US futures are set for a sharply lower open (at least in recent market terms) following a steep decline in European stocks and a selloff in Asian shares, following yesterday's sharp escalation in the war of words between the U.S. and North Korea. In a broad risk-off move U.S. Treasuries rose, the VIX surged above 12 overnight, while German bund futures climbed to the highest level in six weeks. The Swiss franc gained 1.2 percent to 1.1320 per euro...

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Increased demand from Asia helps fill Swiss hotel rooms

The number of overnight stays in Swiss hotels rose by 4.4% in the first half of 2017 compared to the same period the year before. Tourists from India and China were largely responsible for the increase in demand. According to figures released by Federal Statistical Office on Monday, tourists – both domestic and international – spent a total of 17.6 million nights in Swiss hotels during the first semester.

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Addax Petroleum to close operations in Geneva

Chinese-owned oil and gas extractor firm Addax Petroleum is shutting its offices in the Swiss city of Geneva as well as in Aberdeen, Scotland and Houston in the United States. The company on Monday confirmed a report by the Tribune de Genève newspaper, saying its parent firm Sinopec International Petroleum Exploration and Production Corporation (SIPC) would integrate the three offices into a new technical centre in Beijing by the end of this year.

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Switzerland: Number of ‘near miss’ plane incidents double

Switzerland’s transport safety authority reports an increase in serious violations of air safety regulations that could have potentially led to collisions. According the 2016 annual report of the Swiss Transportation Safety Investigation Board released end of July, the number of aviation incidents are on the decrease (1,219 in 2016 vs 1,260 in 2015).

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Aldi Switzerland stops selling eggs as insecticide scandal widens

The discount supermarket chain Aldi Switzerland is withdrawing all imported eggs from sale at its 190 stores as a precaution, it said on Friday, as a scare over possible insecticide contamination spreads. Swiss eggs are not affected, officials say.

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Can Switzerland Survive Today’s Assault On Cash And Sound Money?

“Switzerland will have the last word,” wrote Victor Hugo in the late 19th century. “It possesses one of the most perfect forms of government in the world.” A contemporary of his, Frederick Kuenzli, a scholar of the Swiss Army, boasted: “No purer type of Republican ideals, no more fixed and devoted adherence to those ideals can be found in all the world than in Switzerland.”

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Dying men generate higher health costs

Both gender and location influence the cost of end-of-life healthcare in Switzerland, finds a study funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation. In their analysis of 113,277 people who died between 2008 and 2010, researchers studied regional variations in cost of care during the last 12 months of life in Switzerland. Per person, the mean cost of care during that final year was CHF32,500 ($33,540).

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Gotthard Rail Tunnel Boosts North-South Traffic by a Third

About 2.3 million rail passengers have travelled through the new transalpine tunnel in Switzerland over the past eight months, an increase of 30% compared with same period a year ago. On average, 10,400 people cross the Gotthard base tunnel in central Switzerland every day, according to the Federal Railways.

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