Clouds are gathering over the Swiss economy, with uncertainties regarding the country’s energy supply. UBS is reducing its growth projections in this context, to 2.4% once morest 2.5% in May for 2022 and to 0.9% once morest 1.5% for 2023.
The experts of the bank with the three keys do not favor the scenario of a recession in the short term, without however excluding it completely in the event of a sudden stoppage of Russian deliveries in terms of energy in particular.
“The uninterrupted availability of electricity is a fundamental condition for the smooth functioning of the digital economy,” warned Wednesday at a press conference Alessandro Bee, economist with the number one Swiss bank.
However, Switzerland remains much less dependent on Russia than its European neighbours, with some 5% of its direct energy imports coming from the country of the tsars. The countries of the European Union, for their part, have an average exposure of more than 20%. In terms of consumption, Swiss households also devote half of their budget to energy than European households.
The authors of the report emphasize the importance of establishing priorities among objectives that are sometimes difficult to reconcile, such as decarbonization and security of supply, the abandonment of nuclear power or even the promotion of renewable energies.
To counter the difficulties in terms of energy supply, the economy can count on a potential for catching up at the end of the health crisis, as well as on the now proven propensity of the Swiss National Bank (SNB) to quickly adopt measures intended to curb inflation.
Daniel Kalt, chief economist of the bank in Switzerland, considers that inflation must thus return to the corridor of 0 to 2% targeted as of next year, following having peaked at 2.7% in 2022.
/ATS
