International cooperation

At the bilateral level, FINMA maintains regular contact with the banking and stock exchange supervisory bodies of foreign financial centres. This may involve one or more authorities, depending on the country in question. The depth and frequency of these contacts are governed by the level of activity of Swiss financial intermediaries in the countries in question and vice versa. In some instances the framework and terms of cooperation need to be formalised through written agreements in order to handle the constantly increasing requirements regarding the flow of information between the relevant authorities.

In the banking and insurance sectors, the main focus of cooperation between the authorities is the consolidated supervision of internationally active financial groups. As the supervisory authority of a company's country of origin, FINMA becomes involved if Swiss institutions active abroad (in particular – but not exclusively – the two large banks) are part of such a group. However, it also covers branches and subsidiaries of foreign financial and insurance institutions in Switzerland.

The main purpose of cooperation between supervisory authorities in the supervision of stock exchanges and financial markets is to exchange information regarding potential offences (insider trading, market manipulation, breaches of reporting requirements, illegal solicitation of investors, etc.) that are committed from within Switzerland on a foreign stock exchange or vice versa. The exchange of information in connection with such activities leads to countless challenges on the part of the clients concerned and consequently to court judgements.