Swiss Market Ends Moderately Higher

(RTTNews) - The Switzerland stock market ended on a firm note on Friday, in line with most of the markets across Europe, as investors continued to bet on earnings growth.

The benchmark SMI, which climbed to 12,219.51, ended the session with a gain of 60.35 points or 0.5% at 12,128.76.

Credit Suisse rallied 5.56%. Logitech gained nearly 3% and ABB climbed about 2.5%. Richemont gained 2.1%, while Geberit and Sika moved up 1.56% and 1.31%, respectively.

Partners Group, Holcim, UBS Group, Zurich Insurance Group and Swisscom also ended notably higher, while Swiss Re, Novartis and Alcon shed 0.4 to 0.7%.

In the Swiss Mid Price Index, Zur Rose rallied more than 5%. Tecan Group, Kuehne & Nagel, AMS and Julius Baer gained 2.7 to 3.1%.

SIG Combibloc, BB Biotech, Swatch Group, Cembra Money Bank, Clariant and Georg Fischer also ended sharply higher.

On the economic front, Switzerland's retail sales decreased in March due to higher pandemic-related figures of the previous year, data from the Federal Statistical Office showed.

Retail sales adjusted for sales days and holidays declined a working-day adjusted 5.9% year-on-year in March.

Sales of food, beverages and tobacco fell 8.7% yearly in March and sales of non-food declined 5.8%, the agency said.

On a monthly basis, retail sales fell 0.9% in March.

In real terms, retail sales decreased 6.6% yearly in March and rose 0.8% from a month ago.