BRUSSELS (dpa-AFX) - The Switzerland market drifted down into the red after a flat start on Thursday, but began edging higher past noon, and despite a mild setback around mid afternoon, closed higher thanks to a few frontline stocks finding good support in the final hour.
The benchmark SMI closed up 51.95 points or 0.45% at 11,591.59 after scaling a low of 11,495.82 and a high of 11,605.49 intraday.
Julius Baer rallied 4.71% after reporting a 12% jump in assets under management to 480 billion francs in the first 10 months of 2024.
Total client assets reached 570 billion Swiss francs. The company said the increase in AuM was driven by strong stock markets as well as solid net inflows of 11 billion francs. The Group's CET1 capital ratio improved to 16.7%. In the first ten months of 2024, the gross margin decreased to 83 basis points. In the first ten months of 2024, the number of relationship managers grew by 46 full-time equivalents to 1,389.
The Group currently expects that IFRS net profit for 2024 will significantly exceed the one achieved in fiscal 2023.
Zurich Insurance Group and Logitech International gained 3.13% and 2.57%, respectively.
Givaudan climbed nearly 1.5%. VAT Group and ABB gained 1.2% and 1.08%, respectively. Swiss Re, Lonza Group, Roche Holdings, Partners Group, Alcon, Novartis and Swiss Life Holding closed higher by 0.5 to 1%.
SIG Group closed down 3.6%. Adecco, Lindt Spruengli, Swatch Group and Straumann Holding lost 1.3 to 1.7%.
SGS, Richemont, Nestle, Sandoz Group and Swisscom also closed weak.
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