The SNB's investment policy - some topical issues

November 20, 2014
Money Market Event, Geneva

Summary

In the search for diversification, Asia-Pacific markets in particular have become increasingly important for the Swiss National Bank's (SNB) investment policy in recent years. The SNB took the decision to open a Singapore branch office in mid-2013 with this in mind. The growing importance of Asia-Pacific markets is also reflected in the SNB's foreign exchange reserves, where exposure to Japan, Australia, Singapore and Korea has been increased in recent years. In addition to this, the SNB signed a renminbi investment quota agreement with China's central bank in July 2014. The SNB may invest in the onshore Chinese interbank bond market within the scope of this investment quota, which totals CNY 15 billion (in excess of CHF 2 billion). While this quota represents a small proportion of the SNB's foreign exchange reserves, it allows it to gather some experience of this market.

Another important component of the currency reserves is gold. On 30 November, the Swiss electorate will be voting on the popular initiative 'Save our Swiss gold' (also known as the 'gold initiative'), which the SNB considers to be unnecessary and harmful. The SNB's legal mandate is to ensure price stability. In a system of flexible exchange rates, gold is no longer required for it to perform this function. The gold initiative is harmful because prescriptions on the share of gold in the balance sheet, coupled with a sales ban, would make it considerably more difficult for the SNB to fulfil its mandate in future. Within the scope of its mandate, the SNB needs a certain amount of latitude in order to continue fulfilling its monetary and investment policy objectives, especially given that the Swiss monetary policy landscape is set to remain challenging for the foreseeable future.

Download file now

The file can be downloaded with the button below.

Additional files

Related content

Author(s)

  • Fritz Zurbrügg
    Member of the Governing Board

Your settings

Required: These cookies (e.g. for storing your IP address) cannot be rejected as they are necessary to ensure the operation of the website. These data are not evaluated further.
Analytics: If you consent to this category, data such as IP address, location, device information, browser version and site visitor behaviour will be collected. These data are evaluated for the SNB's internal purposes and are kept for two years.
Third-party: If you consent to this category, third-party services (used, for example, to add social multimedia content to the SNB's website) will be activated which collect personal data, process these data, disclose them abroad - worldwide - and place cookies. The relevant data protection regulations are linked in the 'Privacy statement for the website of the Swiss National Bank'.

Choose your preferred settings:

This website uses cookies, analytics tools and other technologies to provide requested features, content and services, to personalise the content shown, to provide links to social media, and to analyse the use of the website in anonymised form for the purposes of improving usability. Personal data are also disclosed abroad - worldwide - to video service providers and the analytics tools of these providers are used. More information is available under 'Manage settings'.