The Swiss National Bank has updated its exchange rate indices. In an SNB Economic Studies paper, Robert Müller describes how. The upshot is that the SNB considers the Swiss Franc slightly less overvalued than before. From the abstract:
The key aspects of the revision are: the application of the weighting method used by the IMF, which takes into account so-called third-market effects; continuous updating of the countries incorporated into the index; and calculation of a chained index. The methodological changes in the calculation of the new index have only a slight effect on the development of the nominal index. However, the difference between the nominal and real index (CPI-based) has increased with the new calculation. This is explained by the fact that countries with a greater weighting in the new index have higher average rates of inflation than those whose weighting has been reduced.