Representative offices of foreign banks and securities firms

A foreign bank or securities firm needs to be authorised by FINMA if it employs staff in Switzerland who, on a professional basis, permanently represent the foreign institution for advertising or other purposes in or from Switzerland, including in particular forwarding client orders to it, but do not carry out transactions or manage client accounts for the foreign bank that give rise to legal obligations. Representative offices of foreign banks and securities firms are not subject to prudential supervision. However, they must submit an annual report for the foreign bank or securities firm they represent to FINMA within four months after the financial year ends. 

Definition of a foreign bank

Any company organised under foreign law that either holds a banking licence abroad, uses the term "bank" or "Banking" in its name, the description of its purpose or its business documentation or conducts banking business as defined in Article 1a of the Banking Act is considered as a foreign bank.

Definition of a foreign securities firm

Any company organised under foreign law that either holds a securities firm licence abroad, uses the term "securities firm" or a term with a similar meaning in its name, the description of its purpose or its business documentation or operates securities trading as defined in Article 41 of the Financial Institutions Act is considered as a foreign securities firm.

Licensing requirements

For a foreign bank or securities form to obtain a licence to open a representative office, there must be no doubt that the applicant and the representative office meet or can meet all of the licensing requirements. The most important are:

• Appropriate supervision of the foreign bank or securities firm;

• No objections by the responsible foreign supervisory authorities to the opening of a representative office;

• Guarantee of reciprocal rights by the country of domicile of the foreign bank or securities firm and all qualified participants;

• Guarantee of irreproachable business activity by those in charge of the representative office.

Duration of the licensing process

The licensing process for a representative office of a foreign bank takes place in constant dialogue with the applicants. The duration depends on the quality and complexity of the application and the time it takes to receive a response from the competent foreign supervisory authorities.

Contact for questions on the licensing process

The Authorisation section of the Banks division (authorization@finma.ch)

Information and templates

Application templates are available on the FINMA survey and application platform (EHP) for representative offices’ initial applications, as are the following documents. Before submitting a licence application, the specific licensing project is to be presented to FINMA, cf. Assessment of licensing projects and preliminary enquiries. Access to the EHP is not required for this. The licensing project can be submitted directly by email to authorization@finma.ch.

Applicants must self-register via the FINMA homepage to gain access to the EHP. Once the self-registration has been verified by FINMA, the EHP can be accessed via the FINMA portal using two-factor authentication.

In addition, a fully expanded application template is available below as a guide. This document merely serves as an overview and cannot be used as an application.