Europe

Still under the spotlight the purchase of luxury items made by Chinese tourists in Switzerland. In fact, even in April they fell purchases, according to the latest statistics issued by Global Blue, a company that handles VAT refunds on the taxed products. On a year, sales actually declined by 7.8%, after a fall of 19.6% in March.

For Switzerland figures relate mainly to sales of watches, the most purchased items from travelers in transit. The phenomenon concerns however over Europe and France is the country most affected, with a drop of 23% in April after -29.3% in March. The main concerns are the concerns about China’s growth, a certain frugality related to anti-corruption campaign and the beginning of April the new import tax.

Spain has placed on the market a 50-year state title. Following the example of Belgium who recently successfully priced titles in this length of time, even Madrid decided to refinance a maturing issue in 2066. Even Italy is considering to issue a 50-year bond, but for now nothing is yet planned by the Treasury. Interest in the very long-term emissions comes mainly from pension funds and insurance funds, in pursuit of higher returns to zero and at the same time to have in "investment grade securities portfolio". Spain in fact enjoys BBB + rating from Standard & Poo’rs and Fitch and Baa2 by Moody’s.

The number of failures for insolvency suffered in April jumped by 25% to 424 over one year, according to Bisnode’ note today , international economic information companies.

To be precise, in the first four months of the year, 1,541 companies have brought books in court for insolvency figures up 9% over one year. In Ticino, from January to April the failures for insolvency were 112 (+ 13%). Graubünden has gone from 18 to 23 bankruptcies (+ 28%).

Julius Baer announces that it has recorded an increase in deposits of 6 billion, ie by 2% compared to the end of 2015. This progression must constantly increase the supply of capital and consolidation, 1 April 2016, the Italian management company Kairos that manages funds for about 9 billion. A contribution which more than offset the negative trend of the exchange rate fluctuations, primarily the weakness of the US dollar and British pound against the Swiss franc.

The figure divulged by Julius Baer enrolled in the fork of the forecasts of analysts who expected a mass under management of between 290 and 309 billion francs with a consensus at 302.7 billion.

The ECB seems optimistic, not in an exaggerated way, for the Eurozone economy, as confirmed by the minutes of the last meeting took place on 20 and 21 April last. In this way the orientation of President Mario Draghi is confirmed.

A few hours from the minute the FOMC the Fed takes time but says it is ready to raise interest rates in June, Eurotower confirms its objective of achieving inflation at 2%, although the macroeconomic data shows that the ‘Eurozone still gripped by deflation.

Axa Winterthur has improved last year in operating profit before tax in the occupational pension bringing it to 221 million francs compared to 211 million in 2014 while revenue from premiums are ccalo, as reported in a note the group.

The decline on a year of new contracts was 32%; overall, global revenue from premiums fell by 2.1%, to 7.5 billion francs.
As for the pension fund, Axa has obtained 1.8 billion Swiss francs, which corresponds to a gross yield of 3.4%, compared with 3.33% the previous year.

A pink diamond cut in the shape of pear, the largest of its kind ever sold at auction, was sold yesterday at Sotheby’s in Geneva to 27.3 million francs, rising to 30.8 with the associated costs. The price is relatively low compared to the fork provided by the auction house, which ranged from 28 to 38 million dollars. The buyer was not disclosed.

The 15.38 carat stone, called "Unique Pink", was found in a South African mine. Remains undefeated so the record set by "Graff Pink" in 2011 with 46.2 million dollars, while the total for a diamond is 48.5 million, amount paid earlier this year by Hong Kong billionaire Joseph Lau for " Blue Moon ", presented to the 7 year old daughter Josephine.

The Russian company Open Mobile Platform is developing an alternative operating system to Android and iOS, which are currently installed in 90% of the smartphones of the Russian population. In this way Putin intends to break the duopoly of Apple and Google and protect information about their citizens.

The Russian company, founded only a month ago, would be at work in the creation of an operating system based on Linux and derived from Sailfish OS, designed for large enterprises and for those who care about the privacy and security. Initially this OS should only be made available in the Russian language to meet the local demand and regulatory requirements, and then try to expand into the rest of the world.