Swiss Market Ends On Firm Note

(RTTNews) - Swiss stocks turned in a fine performance on Thursday, in line with most of the markets across Europe, amid optimism about a U.S.-EU trade deal materialising sometime soon.

The benchmark SMI closed up 125.08 points or 1.04% at 12,131.94.

Alcon climbed 3.85%. VAT Group and Swatch Group gained 3.33% and 3.1%, respectively. Schindler Ps, Geberit, Sonova, SIG Group, Sika, Logitech International and Adecco moved up 2 to 2.7%.

Straumann Holding, Kuehne + Nagel, SGS, Novartis, UBS Group, Partners Group, Holcim, Amrize, ABB, Julius Baer, Lonza Group and Roche Holding closed up by 1 to 2%.

Barry Callebaut tanked 13.4% after the company cut its sales volume guidance for a second time within three months due to persistent cocoa bean price volatility.

The company booked a sales revenue of 10.95 billion francs for the nine months ended May 31, up from the year-ago 7.32 billion francs. Sales volume, on the other hand, dropped 6.3% to 1.6 million tons.