The Swiss Stock Market Extended Its Winning Streak - Roche In Focus

(RTTNews) - The Swiss stock market ended Friday's session with another gain, extending its winning streak to six sessions. The market rose above the 8,300 point level for the first time since the end of January. Shares of index heavyweight Roche were in demand at the end of the week.

Investors were in a cautious mood ahead of the long holiday weekend for the United States and the upcoming speech from Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen later today. Investors will be paying close attention to Yellen's remarks for any hints regarding whether the Fed intends to raise interest rates at its meeting next month. The upward revision to U.S. GDP data had little impact on trading today.

The Swiss Market Index increased 0.76 percent Friday and finished at 8,292.45. The SMI ended the trading week with an overall gain of 3.7 percent. The Swiss Leader Index climbed 0.39 percent Friday and the Swiss Performance Index rose 0.65 percent.

Roche surged 4.0 percent after it announced positive results from an interim analysis of a study on its Gazyva drug. Gazyva is a treatment for leukemia.

As for the rest of the index heavyweights, Novartis rose 0.3 percent, while Nestle finished the session unchanged.

Aryzta increased 2.1 percent and Galenica advanced 1.0 percent. Syngenta also ended the session with a gain of 0.8 percent. Swisscom rose 0.5 percent after Berenberg reiterated its "Hold" rating on the stock.

Clariant dipped 0.2 percent. Barclays initiated coverage on the stock with an "Equal weight" rating. Meanwhile, Givaudan rose 0.2 percent after it was rated an "Underweight."

Dufry was the top decliner of the session, with a loss of 1.6 percent. Swatch weakened by 1.0 percent and Richemont surrendered 1.2 percent. LafargeHolcim forfeited 0.8 percent and Geberit fell 0.6 percent. UBS decreased 0.3 percent and Credit Suisse lost 0.2 percent.