Switzerland’s foreign trade surplus increased in May, as exports grew faster than imports, figures from the Federal Customs Administration showed Thursday.
The trade surplus climbed to CHF 3.4 billion in May from CHF 1.9 billion in April. In March, the surplus was EUR 3.0 billion.
Now is not the time to raise interest rates, Bank of England Governor Mark Carney said on Tuesday, warning that already weak wage growth risked a further loss of momentum as Britain prepares to leave the European Union.
In a speech to London’s banking community a day after Brexit talks started, Carney dashed any prospect that he might be close to joining the three BoE policymakers who last week unexpectedly voted to raise rates from their record low of 0.25 per cent.
The Swiss government cut its outlook for 2017 economic growth in its latest forecast on Tuesday, adding it expected inflation to remain subdued.
The State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) said it expected economic growth of 1.4 percent in 2017 instead of 1.6% estimated previously in March. At the same time, projection for 2018 was retained at 1.9%.
"The slight downward adjustment compared with the previous forecast takes into account the more sluggish growth seen in the first quarter. Economic growth is expected to accelerate substantially throughout the year due to favourable economic conditions at an international level and thanks to the continued strong sentiment indicators," SECO said.
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Technically speaking, the US 30 years government bond yields curve, from a long term point of view, is still in a bear market. But looking on a short and medium term basis, we must consider some elements to understand if prices could be in a retracement phase of a potential short term rising trend.
First of all, the 30 years Treasury curve, the week that Trump was elected, advanced with the most highly percent daily change in 30 years (1). The price broke the medium term downtrendline (2) but was not able to overcome the previous high around 3,25 of June 2015 (3).
One in five children in rich countries lives in relative poverty, according to a UNICEF report published on Thursday that put the US and New Zealand among the world’s worst performers for youth well-being.
The UN children’s agency UNICEF has warned that its report should serve as a "wake-up call" to the high rate of children in rich countries living in relative poverty.
The report makes clear that "higher incomes do not automatically lead to improved outcomes for all children," said Sarah Cook, director of the UNICEF research center Innocenti. Cook called on all governments to take action in eliminating inequality in child welfare.
Greece’s international lenders prepared on Thursday to unblock as much as €8.5 billion in loans that Athens desperately needs next month to pay its bills, and to give some idea of what debt relief they may offer over the long-term.
One of the reasons why Greece’s bailout program has stalled over the past few months has been a disagreement between the eurozone and the International Monetary Fund on debt relief. The IMF, which has contributed financially to Greece’s first two bailouts but not the third, has wanted more information about what debt relief Greece may get before it gets more involved in the current program, which is due to end in the summer of next year.
The Swiss National Bank kept interest rates unchanged at record lows, citing the strong currency and an absence of price pressures and the SNB held its deposit rate at -0.75%. It also affirmed its commitment to wage currency market interventions and reiterated that the franc was “significantly overvalued.” Consensus forecasts were for an unchanged policy.
