In the words of Patrik Peyer, managing partner of Niederer Kraft Frey (NKF): ‘As the Swiss legal market confronts these multifaceted challenges, the resilience and adaptability of legal practitioners become crucial in shaping a forward-looking legal landscape.’
‘The legal market is always developing in parallel to the general economic situation,’ says Bär & Karrer’s Susanne Schreiber, who co-heads the firm’s tax team. In Q1, Switzerland’s annual inflation rate rose to a high of 3.4% in February, 0.6% up on December 2022. In Q2, things started to look up with rates decreasing to 2.6% in April. Since then, rates have been on a steady decline, remaining at 1.7% for both September and October 2023. Interest rates, too have stabilised. Since July 2023, the Swiss National Bank has kept its policy rate at 1.8%, providing a sense of stability to the Swiss economy. Following these economic trends, there are several trends practitioners have seen regarding the work that’s been done. For example, practice areas such as litigation and tax were extremely busy this year while areas like M&A and capital markets saw a decrease in deal volume compared to previous years. Banking and finance and real estate and construction remained stable throughout 2023.
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