Martin Schlegel, Antoine Martin, Petra Tschudin: Introductory remarks by the Governing Board, Swiss National Bank news conference

Introductory remarks by Mr Martin Schlegel, Chairman of the Governing Board of the SNB, Mr Antoine Martin, Vice Chairman of the Governing Board of the SNB, and Ms Petra Tschudin, Member of the Governing Board of the SNB, at the Media News Conference of the Swiss National Bank, Berne, 12 December 2024.

The views expressed in this speech are those of the speaker and not the view of the BIS.

Ladies and gentlemen

On behalf of the Governing Board, it is my pleasure as Chairman to welcome you to the SNB's news conference. After our introductory remarks, we will take questions from journalists as usual.

Monetary policy decision

I will begin with our monetary policy decision. We have decided to lower the SNB policy rate by 0.5 percentage points to 0.5%. The new policy rate applies from tomorrow, 13 December 2024. Banks' sight deposits held at the SNB will be remunerated at the SNB policy rate up to a certain threshold, and at 0% above this threshold. We also remain willing to be active in the foreign exchange market as necessary.

Underlying inflationary pressure has decreased again this quarter. With today's easing of monetary policy, we are taking this development into account. We will continue to monitor the situation closely, and will adjust our monetary policy if necessary to ensure inflation remains within the range consistent with price stability over the medium term.

Inflation forecast

Allow me to address the development of inflation in more detail. Inflation in the period since the last monetary policy assessment has again been lower than expected. It decreased from 1.1% in August to 0.7% in November. Both goods and services contributed to this decline. Overall, inflation in Switzerland is still being driven mainly by domestic services.