- SNB Chairman Schlegel: SNB policy to stoke inflation slowly in the next quarters
- SNB leaves interest rates unchanged at 0.00% as expected in December
- FX option expiries for 11 December 10am New York cut
- What are the main events for today?
It’s been an empty session in terms of data releases and notable newsflow. The only highlight was the SNB monetary policy decision. The central bank kept interest rates unchanged at 0.00% as expected and slightly downgraded inflation forecasts for 2026 and 2027.
The economic outlook was upgraded due to the recent decrease of US tariffs on Swiss goods to 15%. Chairman Schlegel downplayed the disappointing inflation readings in the recent months and reiterated that the Bank expects inflation to pick up slowly in the next months due to expansionary monetary and fiscal policies.
The Swiss Franc was mostly unchanged after the decision and the press conference, but started to pick up steam on a broad USD weakness that eventually led to a break below the key support around the 0.7980 level on USDCHF.
In the markets, the US dollar remains on the backfoot following the dovish Fed Chair Powell’s press conference where he downplayed the inflation risk and put more emphasis on the labour market.
The US equities, after giving back the post-FOMC gains overnight, are now recovering the losses. US Treasury yields are trading near today’s lows, which also underpinning gold and silver.
In the American session, the main highlight will be the release of the US Jobless Claims figures. Initial Claims are expected at 220K vs 191K prior, while Continuing Claims are seen at 1947K vs 1939K prior.
The data has been pointing to a “low firing, low hiring” labour market for a very long time, and as Fed Chair Powell said yesterday, that’s an unusual situation. The Fed is trying to help the demand side and turn it more into a “low firing, higher hiring” labour market without stoking inflation.
This article was written by Giuseppe Dellamotta at investinglive.com.
