Why Switzerland?
Why Switzerland? Marwan Naja, AS Investment Management January, 2010 I. Executive Summary Swiss Equities Have Outperformed: Here is a fact you probably did not know: The Swiss equity market has arguably been the best performing developed world market over the past 20, 10, 5 and 2 years. The SPI Index, which incorporates over 200 Swiss stocks, is the best performing index in Swiss Franc (“CHF”), US Dollars (“USD”), Euro (“EUR”) and British Pounds (“GBP”) over the past 20 years1,10 years, 5 years, and 2 years when compared to similar broad-based total return indices in the United States (S&P 500 Total Return), the United Kingdom (FTSE 350 Total Return), Germany (CDAX), France (SBF 120 Total Return) and Japan (TOPIX Total Return)2. For most of these periods the magnitude of the outperformance is significant. Furthermore, the Swiss market has exhibited attractive risk characteristics including lower volatility than comparable markets. Figure 1: SPI 20 Year Performance (red) Compared to Major Developed Indices in CHF3 1 The 20 year comparable excludes the EUR which has not existed for that duration and the French SBF 120 TR which was established in 1990 and has underperformed the SPI over the 19 year period. 2 The Swiss market is the best performer in our local currency comparison (stripping out the foreign exchange effects) over 20 years and marginally trails the FTSE 350 for the 10 year, 5 year and 2 year comparisons. 3 Source of all graphs is Bloomberg unless otherwise indicated. Why Switzerland? AS Investment Management Contents I. Executive Summary ............................................................................................................ 1 Swiss Equities Have Outperformed ...................................................................................
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