Reuters exclusive with Swiss National Bank’s decision to abandon currency interventions

Exclusives are great but sometimes the judgment of experienced correspondents can deliver just as big a punch. On Thursday, June 17, Reuters was first — and by a distance — to tell the financial world of the surprise decision by the Swiss National Bank to abandon its currency interventions to prevent the Swiss franc rising too far, too fast. Reuters bested Bloomberg, Dow Jones and Market News. The alerts prompted the Swiss Franc to rocket by around 1 percent. With the bank’s decision read out over a conference call, the judgment came in deciding when to tell the our readers that the previous intervention language had been left out. There was a danger that the SNB would refer to it further on in the statement or at a later news conference, so Reuters also had to box cleverly by saying simply there was no reference in the initial conference call, quickly confirming that the omission was deliberate and building on the story from there. Reuters was first … and proven right.