Tuesday 21 October 2008

Economics of uncertainty


The Swiss Finance Institute found its way into several recent media discussions in the midst of this extraordinary time for the field of finance. Among others, Institute managing director Professor Jean-Pierre Danthine and Professor Martin Hoesli gave interviews and the Institute cropped up in several discussions about the Swiss financial centre.

An expert of property finance, Martin Hoesli has advised governments and pension funds on how to assess risk adjusted returns in the real estate sector and brings an empirical eye to the housing market in Switzerland and abroad. His timely new book "Real estate investment - Decision and Risk Management" has just been published by Paris-based Economica.

Jean-Pierre Danthine has given numerous interviews for print and radio in recent weeks, most recently on the Swiss approach to supporting the financial system through research and education. The goal, according to Danthine, is to strengthen Europe's research culture in the field of finance to be commensurate with its economic significance internationally.

Geneva based daily Le Temps claims that research is acutely needed as ballast in the seas of economic uncertainty. And Zurich based Finanz und Wirtschaft believes that new initiatives such as the Swiss Finance Institute cannot come soon enough in a financial system seeking an alternative to the specific forms of intervention coming from Washington and Brussels.