Swiss Market Ends Marginally Down

(RTTNews) - The Switzerland stock market, which stayed weak till about the penultimate hour of the day's trading session on Thursday, aw some brisk buying in closing minutes, but still ended the day on a slightly negative note.

The benchmark SMI, which fell to 10,426.20 a little past mid afternoon, climbed to 10,502.14 towards the fag end of the session, but dropped down to settle at 10,473.45, recording a marginal loss of 10.69 points or 0.1%.

Roche Holding shed about 1.1%. Credit Suisse ended nearly 1% down. Novartis and Nestle ended lower by 0.76% and 0.51%, respectively.

Richemont climbed 2.3% and Sonova surged 2.05%. Partners Group ended 1.6% up and Lonza Group advanced 1.35%. Sika, Givaudan and Logitech gained 1 to 1.15%.

In the Mid Price Index, Schindler Holding and Schindler Ps drifted down 4.36% and 4.2%, respectively.

Tecan Group gained nearly 4%, Temenos Group, Bachem Holding and Straumann Holding gained 3 to 3.32%, while AMS, Georg Fischer, PSP Swiss Property, Swatch Group, VAT Group and Zur Rose gained 1.4 to 2.5%.

In economic news, Switzerland's foreign trade surplus increased in the third quarter, as exports rebounded amid a fall in imports, data from the Federal Customs Administration showed on Thursday.

The trade surplus rose to CHF 8.034 billion in the third quarter from CHF 7.634 billion in the previous three-month period.

Exports climbed 0.7% sequentially in the September quarter, reversing a 0.6% fall in the June quarter. Meanwhile, imports logged a 0.5% decline in the third quarter, in contrast to a 0.5% gain in the previous quarter.

In nominal terms, both exports and imports climbed by 0.8% and 0.7%, respectively.

According to the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry, watch exports grew sharply by 19.1% year-on-year in September.