Research

The recent appreciation of the Swiss franc has sent shockwaves through Swiss firms, resulting in job losses and lower research budgets. But viewed long-term, Switzerland’s export-driven economy has adapted remarkably well to a strong currency, according to a government report published on Tuesday.

This is the overall conclusion of five studies, commissioned by the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (Seco), released on Tuesday. They examined the aftermath of the so-called Swiss franc shock, which was triggered when the Swiss National Bank (SNB) ended its longstanding ceiling of CHF1.20 to the euro almost three years ago. That move suddenly made Swiss exports 10% more expensive and cut Swiss economic growth to 0.6% in 2015 from 1.8% a year earlier.

The gender pay gap refers to the difference in pay between men and women are paid for doing exactly the same job. In most cases, women are paid less tha their male counterparts.

Women in the UK stop being paid on 15th October whereas the average cut off date for Europe is 30th October. According to Eurostat, the gap between male and female salaries in the UK is 20 per cent. The disparity means that by 16 October men have already been paid the amount it would take a woman doing the same job a whole year to earn.

The world of hedge funds is often a cut throat one, where manipulation is often considered just a part of the game. But a new study shows that the most aggressive, ruthless traders actually do worse than the ones who try a little tenderness.

The study, found in the latest issue of Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin, finds that hedge fund managers who exhibit ‘psychotic’ behavior (defined by healthcare professionals as someone who acts in a manipulative fashion for personal gain) had the worst investment records.

Environmental pollution – from filthy air to contaminated water – is killing more people every year than all war and violence in the world. More than smoking, hunger or natural disasters. More than AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria combined.

One out of every six premature deaths in the world in 2015 – about 9 million – could be attributed to disease from toxic exposure, according to a major study released Thursday in the Lancet medical journal. The financial cost from pollution-related death, sickness and welfare is equally massive, the report says, costing some $4.6 trillion in annual losses – or about 6.2 percent of the global economy.

Women are consistently underrepresented in scientific research positions-a disparity that is particularly egregious in computational fields. Now newly published research from Harvard Medical School reveals this gender gap extends to paper authorship with most papers that appear in peer-reviewed publications written by men.

The study analyzed paper authorship by gender across several fields-computational biology, quantitative biology, biology and computer science. The analysis reveals that gender disparities in the interdisciplinary fields of computational and quantitative biology were worse than they were in biology-a relatively gender-balanced field-but better than they were in computer science, a decidedly male-dominated field.

Deutsche Bank analysts have warned China could be at the centre of the next financial crisis. Research by the bank’s strategists Jim Reid, Nick Burns, Sukanto Chanda and Craig Nicol found China still needs to reposition its economy "from manufacturing to services and investment to consumption.”

Equities and private equity drove a turnaround in family office investment performance this past year, as revealed in the newly-released Global Family Office Report 2017 (GFO).

The composite global portfolio of family offices (FOs) returned a healthy 7% in 2016, compared with 2015’s disappointing 0.3%. Growth was driven by equities and private equities, which represent a combined 47% of family office portfolio. Meanwhile, performance of hedge funds and real estate was more subdued, and their popularity among FOs declined accordingly.

Facebook will see a decline among teenagers in the U.S. this year, says market research firm eMarketer. Facebook usage among U.S. users between the ages of 12 and 17 is expected to decline for the first time this year, falling 3.4% from the previous year, according to the research. While this decline gives Snap Inc. a rare edge, as teens are fleeing to its platform, Facebook is still in the game as teens seem to be spending time on its other property, Instagram.