swiss economy is still not fully utilised overall. technical capacity utilisation in manufacturing remains considerably below its long - term average. although employment was up in the first quarter, the unemployment rate remained unchanged. we expect the moderate recovery to continue in the coming quarters. for 2014, we anticipate that the growth rate will remain at around 2. 0 %. as we continue to see gradual improvement in the international environment, export demand is likely to rise. over time, this should encourage corporate investment and stimulate demand for labour. the level of residential construction orders remains high. on the whole, however, we expect a considerable slowdown in the growth momentum of residential construction investment. in addition to global risks, the swiss economy also faces uncertainty at home. in the past few weeks, the snb ’ s delegates for regional economic relations asked companies to assess the impact of the popular initiative on curbing mass immigration on their business activity. the results suggest a tangible level of uncertainty about economic conditions. most companies have not taken any specific measures, however. monetary and financial conditions i will now turn to monetary and financial conditions. after about two years of negative inflation, consumer price inflation has been practically zero for some months now. this very restrained development is also reflected in inflation expectations. the majority of market participants expect inflation to remain unchanged in the short term. over a longer horizon of more than two years, the relevant surveys show that the expected rate of inflation is approximately 1. 0 %. these results are consistent with our assessment of the inflation outlook. bis central bankers ’ speeches geopolitical risks and mixed economic data in the major economies led to stronger demand for secure investments. this was reflected in falling yields on long - term government bonds. my colleague, fritz zurbrugg, will talk to you about developments in the financial markets in more detail. mortgage rates also declined again, thereby further bolstering demand for mortgage loans. however, the slowdown of momentum in mortgage lending, which has been observed for some time now, continued. this is a step in the right direction. nevertheless, imbalances remain. it is therefore still too early for an all - clear. given the high level of liquidity, money market rates remained at a low level. even prior to the introduction of negative interest rates by the european central bank ( ecb ), swiss franc libor futures slipped well into negative territory. we are closely monitoring the impact of the recent interest rate reductions in the euro area

could thus be scheduled to begin next year when the legal framework will be in place. greater uncertainty surrounds the question of the allocation of excess reserves, but this will have no impact on our sales intentions. as no precise date for the beginning of our sales activities could be set, i will limit myself to indicate to you in what spirit we plan to approach this question. in my opinion, two observations seem essential : first, as a major holder of gold, the swiss national bank has no interest in adopting a strategy which would push the price down. we know that 1300 tonnes of gold cannot be absorbed by the market in a short period of time. we therefore are considering distributing the sales over a period of several years. second, we intend to keep important gold holdings. once the sales programme has come to an end, gold will continue to play an important role in our monetary reserves. the recent revision of the constitution has led to the stipulation that we should maintain “ sufficient ” gold reserves. the fact that this precision was introduced at the initiative of our parliament indicates that the swiss people wish to keep ample gold reserves. consequently, we do not envisage going beyond the announced plan of selling 1300 tonnes.