Motivated by recent US evidence, we evaluate the predictive power of changes in the weight of large firms in the aggregate stock market ("Goliath vs David" (GVD)) for Swiss stock market returns and bond market returns. Previous research suggests that the asset return dynamics in the US and Switzerland differ markedly. Forecasting Swiss asset returns hence constitutes a challenging "out-of-sample" test for GVD. Over the sample period from January 1999 to December 2017, we find that the Swiss version of GVD exhibits predictive power for Swiss stock and bond market returns even in the presence of global predictors. However, Swiss bond market returns are best predicted by the US term spread.
Swiss franc exchange rates exhibit safe‐haven characteristics, which suggest a close link between the forward premium puzzle and profitability of the carry trade. Our analysis of Swiss franc exchange rates shows that the two phenomena are distinct from each other, thus corroborating U.S. dollar evidence. Persistent exposures to two different global shocks drive the two phenomena in Swiss franc exchange rates. Moreover, we find significant links between expected average Swiss franc exchange rate changes and macroeconomic conditions during the period of the minimum Swiss franc exchange rate against the euro, but not during the rest of the sample period.
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