Any individual or company seeking to manage clients’ money or take money from investors, underwrite insurance policies, or set up and manage a collective investment scheme requires authorisation from FINMA. Only where statutory requirements have been met are licences issued.
Authorised companies are then supervised. FINMA supervision varies in intensity. Depending on the legal provisions, it can range from intensive, ongoing supervision to a simple act of registration, after which FINMA will only step in if it receives reports of inappropriate conduct. Under certain circumstances, service providers must join a private self-regulatory organisation instead.
To check whether an individual, a company or a financial product has been authorised, you can search for the name here.
FINMA keeps lists of all authorised institutions and investment funds. These are regularly updated. A supervised institution may have been authorised but not yet be included in the list. Similarly, a supervised institution may still feature on the list even though it has lost its authorisation.
For authorised audit firms, please use the register provided on the website of the Federal Audit Oversight Authority (FAOA).
Client advisers of Swiss financial service providers which are not subject to prudential supervision in Switzerland must sign up to an adviser register to carry out their activities. The registration body manages the adviser register and decides which client advisers to add to and delete from the register.
Insurance intermediaries are brokers who offer insurance contracts, for example on behalf of insurance companies. Insurance intermediaries are not supervised by FINMA, but they can have their names entered in a register kept by FINMA. Independent insurance intermediaries must be on this register. Intermediaries who are tied to an insurance company have the right to be entered.
In addition to the above list, FINMA provides the available business identification numbers (UID) for authorised companies as a service.
In you are in any doubt, contact the following address to find out whether a service provider has been authorised to operate:
Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority FINMA
Laupenstrasse 27
CH – 3003 Bern
Hotline: +41 31 327 98 88
Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. – 12 noon
Email: questions@finma.ch