Archive – Banking & Fintech

Price hike sparks higher cigarette sales

This content was published on Feb 9, 2009 Vendors sold around 637 million packs of cigarettes in 2008. While that is up from 2007, it is considerably less than a decade ago when consumers burned through 772 million packs. Stefan Schmidt of the Customs Office said the slight increase in sales – 2.7 per cent – probably did not signal an increase in…

The life Ticino emigrants left behind

This content was published on Feb 9, 2009

Swiss chocolate proves to be crisis-resistant

This content was published on Feb 9, 2009 Sales rose equally at home and abroad in 2008, Chocosuisse, the association representing Swiss chocolate manufacturers, said on Monday. The 18 producers saw sales increase by two per cent on 2007 to 184,969 tons, with turnover improving by 9.3 per cent to SFr1.818 billion ($1.56 billion). More than 60 per cent of all the chocolate…

Snow buffers ski industry against crisis

This content was published on Feb 7, 2009 Around 100 specialists from Europe and the United States, who recently met in the Swiss resort of Zermatt, found that while most sectors of the economy were affected by the global downturn, the ski industry was still solid. “The season is going very well and, given the number of reservations, we know it will continue…

Downturn has greater impact than expected

This content was published on Feb 6, 2009 That is the conclusion of the KOF Swiss Economic Institute. The results of its latest surveys were published on Friday. Production in all fields, KOF said, slowed, stagnated or sank in the 4th quarter of 2008. This hit exports and banks particularly hard. For the first half of 2009 none of the sectors are expecting…

Banking ombudsman flooded with complaints

This content was published on Feb 6, 2009 At a news briefing on Friday in Zurich, Hanspeter Häni said his office had to deal with 4,073 complaints last year, a huge increase from the 1,505 he received in 2007. Most of the extra burden came from last September’s collapse of the United States investment bank Lehman Brothers, which provoked 1,800 complaints from people…

Boom market buoys cheese exports

This content was published on Feb 6, 2009 Emmental remained the most popular variety, despite a slight decline, with 21,603 tons sold. That represents over 22 million litres of milk used in its production. Emmental, known in some parts of the world as Swiss Cheese, was followed by Raclette and Tilsit. Sales in those two varieties increased 31.4 per cent and 31 per…

Bear market eats into Bär profits

This content was published on Feb 6, 2009 The result, announced on Friday, is a 30 per cent decline over the previous year for Switzerland’s third-largest bank. The Zurich-based bank said total client assets fell 29 per cent to SFr338 billion but it had strong inflows with net new money of SFr22 billion. It left its dividend unchanged at SFr0.50 and said it…

Syngenta profit up for sixth straight year

This content was published on Feb 6, 2009 Sales in the Basel-based firm’s crop protection unit rose 22 per cent over last year to $9.2 billion and seed sales were up 16 per cent to $2.4 billion, it said on Friday. Earnings per share were $14.63. The result was Syngenta’s sixth consecutive year of growth. Chief executive Mike Mack praised the results in…

Pharmaceuticals face recession health check

This content was published on Feb 5, 2009 Profits leapt 25 per cent last year at Swiss giant Novartis while rival Roche forged ahead with its hostile bid for biotech firm Genentech despite a dip in results. But balance sheets alone do not tell the whole story. Pharmaceutical companies traditionally weather economic downturns better than other industries as health spending is considered a…

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