Worries about the European debt crisis and the prospect of US credit rating’s downgrade increased demand for safe currencies today. As a result, the Swiss franc advanced versus the euro, but demand for safety benefited more for the US dollar and the Japanese yen.

Finland’s Justice Ministry reported that support of the True Finns reached 19 percent. The party’s leader Timo Soini says that Finland’s taxpayers shouldn’t have paid for aid to Greece or Ireland. If his party would win, Finland may block the bailout for Portugal as approval of all the nations of the European Union is required to authorize the decision. Greece’s Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou stated that restructuring of Greece’s debt wasn’t considered and EU spokeswoman Chantal Hughes confirmed these claims.

Mood on markets deteriorated even further after Standard & Poor’s put the US credit rating outlook to negative. This was an unpleasant surprise to market participants as the US was one of the major sources for optimism about the global growth.

EUR/CHF dropped from 1.2864 to 1.2764 today as of 20:41 GMT. USD/CHF rose from 0.8925 to 0.8966. CHF/JPY dropped from 93.18 to 91.41 before trading at 92.20.

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