Off the wire
• UN, Gambia to investigate December coup attempt in Gambia  • 1st LD: U.S. drone strike kills 6 in NW Pakistan  • Urgent: Senior Al-Shabaab figure surrenders to Somali gov't  • Ebola-hit Guinea to reopen schools on Monday  • Roundup: KSE maintains record-smashing rally amid rate cut hopes  • China changes rules of calculating lending, deposits  • Africa Focus: Kenya's consumer watchdog calls for further drop in fuel prices  • Dutch housing market recovers faster than expected  • 2nd LD Writethru: Filipe Nyusi sworn in as Mozambique's new president  • Pope concludes visit to Sri Lanka  
You are here: 　 Home

Swiss central bank lifts currency cap

Xinhua, January 15, 2015 Adjust font size:

The Swiss National Bank (SNB) surprisingly announced on Thursday that it is removing its minimum exchange rate of Swiss franc 1.20 per euro, leading the Swiss franc surged to a high level against the euro.

Thursday's announcement put an end to the longstanding policy staged out by the central bank of Switzerland around three years ago in an effort to defend the Swiss economy from the euro area's debt crisis.

"The minimum exchange rate was introduced during a period of exceptional overvaluation of the Swiss franc and an extremely high level of uncertainty on the financial markets. This exceptional and temporary measure protected the Swiss economy from serious harm," the SNB said in the statement.

"While the Swiss franc is still high, the overvaluation has decreased as a whole since the introduction of the minimum exchange rate. The economy was able to take advantage of this phase to adjust to the new situation," the central bank announced.

Meanwhile, the SNB is lowering the interest rate on sight deposit account balances that exceed a given exemption threshold to -0.75 percent.

The move is "to ensure that the discontinuation of the minimum exchange rate does not lead to an inappropriate tightening of monetary conditions", according to the bank. Endit