Switzerland Today
Hello from Bern.
Swiss banks were built on the qualities of secrecy and reliability. The secrecy has been under pressure for years. Is the reliability side also now in trouble? Credit Suisse, the country’s second-biggest bank, certainly faces a challenge to brush off all the bad press. Today it posted one of the worst financial results in its history. First the other news of the day.
In the news: perceptions of racism, safety-conscious king, and recycling.
- A majority (60%) of Swiss think racism is an “important social issue”, according to a biennial survey on diversity published today by the Federal Statistical Office. This is similar to the figure recorded two years ago. As for the integration of migrants in the country, 59% of respondents rated it as good, down five percentage points on 2020.
- If British newspapers are to be believed, British monarch Charles III is to break with a 45-year tradition of skiing in Switzerland this year. Ahead of his coronation in Westminster Abbey on May 6, he apparently does not want to risk an injury. Charles, then a prince, first visited the upmarket Swiss resort of Klosters in 1977 and has returned every year since.
- The Federal Audit Office wants more transparency around the various fees and taxes that fund Switzerland’s recycling system. CHF176 million ($192 million) in contributions were collected in 2019, but consumers lack information about whether their waste is “simply collected, burned, or actually recycled”, the auditors said.
Credit Suisse: Losses, cuts, and hopes for renewal.
Credit Suisse capped another year of turmoil by reporting today an annual loss of CHF7.3 billion ($7.9 billion) for 2022. This compares to a CHF1.65 billion annual loss in 2021. It’s the worst year for the bank since the record losses of CHF8.2 billion during the financial crisis in 2008. Last October it already announced 9,000 job cuts.
Today, the bank cited the adverse impact of a “challenging macro and geopolitical environment with market uncertainty and client risk aversion.” Indeed, wealthy clients withdrew some CHF123.2 billion of assets from the bank over the course of 2022, and the total amounts of assets under management fell almost 20% to CHF1.294 trillion.
But as SWI swissinfo.ch financial journalist Matthew Allen writes today, the losses also come after a wave of CS scandals in the past years: spying on a former employee, enabling drug dealers to launder money, involvement in a Mozambique corruption case, a chairman violating Covid lockdown rules, a massive leak of client data to the media, etc.
Where did it go wrong, he asks? The finger of blame seems to hint at leadership failures over the years, as well as the bank “losing touch with its Swiss roots” too fast (Credit Suisse was founded way back in 1865 by iconic industrialist Alfred Escher). Will its new strategy, which includes new capital flowing in from the Middle East, help to turn fortunes around?
Turkey/Syria quake: Switzerland clearing and collecting.
Swiss rescue workers fear the chances of finding quake survivors are diminishing as the death toll in Turkey and Syria rises above 17,000. Some 87 members of the Swiss Rescue unit, along with 22 personnel and 14 search dogs from Redog, have rescued 37 people from the rubble. But the chances of finding more are fading given the time people have been trapped without water in freezing conditions. Swiss Solidarity, the humanitarian arm of the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation – SWI swissinfo.ch’s parent company – has so far raised over CHF7 million for the region in its fundraising campaignExternal link.
Animal tracks: end of an era for Circus Knie.
The Swiss national circus “Knie” is ending its historic connection with Switzerland’s Federal Railways, writes SRF today, quoting the Linth-Zeitung newspaper. Whereas in the past, the circus would shuttle around the country by rail, the modern form of touring and rising costs have put an end to this. And while circus animals haven’t travelled by rail for years (it’s rather the material infrastructure concerned by the recent announcement), this didn’t stop SRF getting nostalgic about elephants and giraffes rolling into town. You can see some such nice black-and-white photos hereExternal link.
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