(BFM Bourse) – The Swiss central bank posted a loss of 142.4 billion Swiss francs (just over 143 billion euros) in the first nine months of the year, mainly due to losses on its positions denominated in foreign currencies.
It is a colossal loss posted by the Swiss National Bank. The Swiss central bank suffered a heavy loss over nine months, of 142.4 billion Swiss francs (143.4 billion euros), due to the decline in stock markets, it announced on Monday.
In detail, for the period between January and the end of September, the Swiss National Bank (SNB) recorded a loss of 141 billion francs on its “foreign currency positions” (its investments denominated in currencies other than the Swiss franc ), she said in a statement, reflecting the tremors in the financial markets. Of this amount, “interest-bearing securities and interest rate instruments recorded a price loss of 70.9 billion francs, equity securities and equity instruments a loss of 54.2 billion Finally, the exchange losses totaled an amount of 24.4 billion francs”, further details the SNB.
Moreover, its stock of gold remained unchanged, but its value fell with the fall in the price of the yellow metal and a loss of 1.1 billion francs.
The negative interest rate, which it applied to the assets that the banks had to entrust to it until a major reorientation of its monetary policy on September 22, also suffered a loss of 24.1 million francs, he added. she detailed.
A reorientation of monetary policy
The Swiss franc is one of the great safe havens, such as the dollar, gold, the yen or German bonds. To discourage investors from taking refuge behind its currency during phases of market uncertainty, the Swiss central bank applied a negative rate from 2015 to September 2022, which had the effect of raising the cost of deposits.
But with inflation, it proceeded to a major reorientation of its monetary policy by abandoning this negative rate. In September, it tightened its key rate to raise it to 0.5%.
For the sake of transparency, the Swiss central bank publishes quarterly details of the evolution of its monetary reserves, which include gold, stocks and bonds. The evolution of its balance sheet is closely monitored in Switzerland insofar as it pays part of its profit each year to the Confederation and the cantons.
However, its results can vary greatly from one year to another. In 2018, it had already suffered a loss of 14.9 billion francs due to the fall in the markets at the end of the year. The Swiss central bank then followed up with three years of profits. These amounted to 48.9 billion francs in 2019, 20.9 billion in 2020 and 26.3 billion in 2021.
(With AFP)
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