Swiss Fintech Innovations represents the interests of its members (mainly Swiss banks and insurance companies) in the field of digitisation and innovation in the financial and insurance industries. Our Regulations working group deals with legislation and regulation in these areas and has already presented its positions on several occasions in the legislative process on Fintech legislation (cf. statement on the Fintech proposal, the E-ID Act and the amendment of the KKG).
Our statement can be summarised as follows:
Amendments to the Banking Ordinance (BankV)
1. The interpretation of the prohibition on investments and interest is too narrow and severely restricts the scope of the “Fintech license”. The explanatory report is also sometimes confusing. It must be made clear in the consultation report which application possibilities exist with the “Fintech licence”.
2. it must be made clear in the consultation report that the new licence holders can open an account with the Swiss National Bank (SNB), otherwise there are hardly any sensible application possibilities for the new “Fintech licence”.
3. The minimum capital of 5% of the public contributions received is clearly too high in view of the fact that these public contributions may not be “worked on” in any form whatsoever and must be kept in Switzerland and separate from own funds.
On the amendment of the Ordinance on the KKG (VKKG)
4. In previous opinions (on the Fintech proposal, on the E-ID Act and on the amendment of the CCA), SFTI has already advocated the creation of a regulatory level playing field within the framework of the legislation. Accordingly, SFTI agrees in principle to the revision of the CCMA and also to the now presented amendment of the associated ordinance. 5.
5. These changes lead to a fundamental change in the thrust of the Fintech proposal with which SFTI disagrees. Instead of removing hurdles for digital and innovative business models, new hurdles will be created. SFTI is therefore once again requesting that innovative and digital financial services in this area be facilitated or made possible for all market participants through additional adjustments (now at least to the ordinance), which would also preserve the spirit of the Fintech proposal.
6. In concrete terms, the ordinance must stipulate that the formal requirement of written form in the KKG must be fulfilled by using a “form that can be verified in text”.
Read the full statement SFTI Stellungnahme Fintech Lizenz (german).