Accounts for 2024 slightly better than expected, announces Keller-Sutter
Keystone-SDA
The Swiss government’s 2024 accounts, forecast to show a deficit of CH 2.6 billion ($2.8 billion), should be better than expected, announces Finance Minister Karin Keller-Sutter. But for the following years, the situation will not improve, she warns.
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“The one-off contribution of almost one billion that Parliament wants for SBB will be paid in 2025 instead of last year,” explains the finance minister in an interview broadcast on Sunday by Le Matin Dimanche and the SonntagsZeitung. “But it’s not yet possible to put a figure on the additional income.
On the other hand, the outlook for the following years is bleaker, with annual deficits of around 3 billion francs a year, she points out. In 2026, there is already “an additional burden of around 2 billion”, due in particular to the 13th AHV pension, she notes. “The good news is that we’re going to receive unanticipated additional revenue from Geneva.
The canton of Geneva will receive significantly higher revenues for the years 2022 and 2023, thanks in particular to companies active in commodities and energy trading, she explains. “According to initial estimates, these extraordinary revenues could bring in several hundred million a year for the next three years”.
Keller-Sutter notes, however, that these sums are “far” from sufficient “to turn the federal finances around”. Expenditure continues to rise, she warns. The “relief program” only reduces spending growth from 3% to 2%, she adds.
Translated from French by DeepL/ds
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