Executive Summary
The Swiss franc trades at USD/CHF 0.7782 and EUR/CHF 0.9023 — the strongest levels since the SNB removed the EUR/CHF floor in January 2015 — driven by the convergence of Iran-US war safe-haven flows, record gold above $5,200/oz, and Switzerland's structural current account surplus of ~7% of GDP. The SNB, pinned at 0.00% since June 2025 with inflation stuck at just 0.1% YoY and goods prices in outright deflation at -1.4% YoY, has issued extraordinary unsolicited intervention warnings in early March — an escalation not seen in years. The fundamental tension is between CHF's structural appreciation drivers (current account surplus, AAA credit, quadrupled reserve allocation, gold correlation) and the SNB's toolbox of FX intervention and potential negative rates. Our tactical stance is Bullish CHF with moderate conviction — the safe-haven bid from the Iran conflict dominates near-term flows and the March 19 SNB meeting is unlikely to deliver sufficient firepower to reverse it. Strategically, we remain Bullish CHF but at lower conviction, as de-escalation of the Iran war, European fiscal stimulus, and aggressive SNB intervention could narrow the gap between spot and consensus forecasts (0.94–0.95 EUR/CHF by year-end).