«The new year 2021 is off to a good start and our objective is to grow further the Swiss portals»

09.04.2021
Ms. Fassi, you live and work in Bergamo. The city became world famous at the beginning of the Covid pandemic. What is the situation today?
Bergamo is the symbol of the pandemic as it was the city most affected by the first wave of Covid. At the beginning of 2020, when people in Italy only heard about the pandemic on television and no one had the slightest idea of what was going to happen next, in Bergamo we could hear the uninterrupted sound of ambulance sirens and bells ringing in our churches.
Faced with this extreme situation, in mid-February 2020 I immediately decided to close our offices and activate Smart Working from home for all our staff. I, in particular, living in the centre of Bergamo, moved to work in a house in the countryside about 30 km from Bergamo.
We lived through months of terror, but thank goodness none of us fell ill, and we continued to carry out our work tirelessly, always with our heads held high. After seeing the military vehicles leaving Bergamo loaded with our dead on television, we stopped to remember them, and the next day we resumed our work.
At such a difficult time, our customers have rewarded us by continuing to purchase the services we offer through our portals.
Today, a year after the start of the pandemic, the situation is fairly calm. Since July 2020, we have reopened our offices, and although Lombardy is in the Red Zone and therefore subject to a series of travel restrictions, we are all working calmly.
Again, how have you and your team coped professionally with this extremely challenging period?
In the extremely difficult situation in which we found ourselves, I can only say that I found extreme cooperation from every human and professional point of view. My staff and I didn’t stop for a moment and they all worked hard from home. I also found considerable support from the banks we’ve been working with for years and from the various consultants who follow us.
All of us have unfortunately lost people we knew, but now we are just trying not to look back and want to look forward with optimism.
You publish a whole series of newsletters. Can you give an overview?
As you know, we have been present in Switzerland since 2009 with three vertical financial portals dedicated to institutional investors. Each of the three portals focuses on certain topics that are easily identifiable in the name of the site.
ETFWorld.ch focuses on ETFs, ETPs, ETCs and everything related to these topics such as ETF market analysis, interviews, new listings, nominations, changes and ESG issues.
AdvisorWorld.ch provides in-depth coverage of equity and balanced funds and everything related to these topics such as equity market analyses, structured products, nominations, associations and ESG issues.
BondWorld.ch focuses on bonds, bond funds, balanced funds and everything related to these topics such as bond market analysis, interest rates, central banks, macro indicators, nominations, associations and ESG issues.
For each of these sites there is a dedicated Newsletter that we send regularly to our users so that they are promptly informed about the latest news from the markets.
Our users can easily subscribe to one, two or three newsletters depending on the topics they are interested in. Users who subscribe to the three newsletters (all free of charge) can keep their finger on the pulse of everything that is happening in relation to the topics covered by the sites.
You are an entrepreneur with vision and optimism. What are your goals for this year?
Every entrepreneur everywhere has certain characteristics that characterise them, and among these, vision and optimism certainly occupy an important position.
The new year 2021 is off to a good start, I believe it will continue along this path and I can say that the main objective for the current year is to grow the portals with more and more valid and targeted content on Swiss finance. This important objective is being pursued by enriching the content on the site with new sections, in-depth analysis and external collaborations with constant attention to maintaining the high level of quality achieved.
I can affirm that, thanks to the commitment of all our staff, some of the fruits of our efforts can already be seen and I am confident that they will be seen more and more in the future.
And a very personal question: What is a typical working week like for you?
The working week is always very intense and demanding but at the same time challenging, especially in this period. I always try to structure the week very schematically, in order to coordinate and direct the efforts of all the staff towards a single goal and at the same time I try to be ready to change priorities according to the actual needs of the moment.
I would like to conclude by saying that we are proud to be Partner of the two major «Mountain Talks» Summer & Winter Summits organised by Fundplat and thank Thomas J. Caduff for the opportunity.
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Delia Maria Fassi is founder and CEO of DMF Srl. Before launching the company, she worked for Sviluppo Finanziaria as a stock market analyst from a fundamental point of view, to which she added an expertise in Technical Analysis. Subsequently, when ING Bank’s Milan Branch acquired Sviluppo Finanziaria, she worked in the analysis of financial markets and then in consulting to Institutions. At ING Bank, she created and managed the consulting office for institutions on Italian government bonds. She has a degree in Business Administration from Bocconi University and has followed two master’s in Bond management at SDA Bocconi. She is also a chartered accountant and auditor.