The complete text of Dr Alexander Ressos’s study of Basel as an international financial centre — from Augusta Raurica, the Council of Basel and humanist printing to private banking, the Bank for International Settlements, life sciences, insurance and the outlook to 2035 — published here chapter by chapter.
The complete text of Dr Alexander Ressos’s study of Basel as an international financial centre — from Augusta Raurica, the Council of Basel and humanist printing to private banking, the Bank for International Settlements, life sciences, insurance and the outlook to 2035 — published here chapter by chapter.
Each section of the book appears here as a separate article, with its footnotes, in the order of the book. The articles can be read on their own; the part pages collect the chapters of each part.
Preface
Basel is rarely named among the great financial centres. Zurich has the banks and the stock exchange, Geneva the private banks, the commodity traders and international Geneva. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Rhine Knee: Geography, Celtic Settlement and Augusta Raurica — conclusion
Basel was born at a bend in the Rhine, at the meeting point of routes from the North Sea, Burgundy, the Swiss plateau and Italy. Read more Basel · OriginsA city at the bend of the river
Every financial centre begins as a place where goods, people and information pass. Basel owes its existence to a bend in a river. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Upper Rhine as an economic region
Basel's position cannot be understood in isolation from the region around it. The Upper Rhine plain, stretching from Basel to the area of Mainz and Frankfurt, is one of the most fertile and densely… Read more Basel · OriginsCeltic Basel: the Gasfabrik settlement and the oppidum on the Münsterhügel
The earliest traces of a substantial settlement on the site of Basel date from the late Iron Age, the period of the La Tène culture. Read more Basel · OriginsAugusta Raurica: a Roman colony on the Rhine
The Roman presence in the region began shortly after Caesar's victory. According to the inscription on his mausoleum at Gaeta, Lucius Munatius Plancus, governor of Gallia Comata and one of Caesar's… Read more Basel · OriginsRoads over the Jura
The prosperity of Augusta Raurica depended on roads as much as on the river. The Romans built a network of roads that connected the colony with the rest of the Empire. Read more Basel · OriginsThe silver treasure of Kaiseraugst
One find from Augusta Raurica deserves special attention in a book about money. In the winter of 1961 to 1962, during construction work near the late Roman fort at Kaiseraugst, an excavator uncovered… Read more Basel · OriginsThe economy of the frontier: army pay, coinage and supply
The prosperity of Augusta Raurica depended to a large extent on the Roman army. From the reign of Augustus onwards, the Rhine frontier was guarded by legions and auxiliary units stationed in camps… Read more Basel · OriginsFrom the colony to the fort: late antiquity on the Rhine
The prosperity of Augusta Raurica did not last. From the middle of the third century AD, the Roman frontier on the upper Rhine and the Danube came under pressure. Read more Basel · OriginsAlemanni, Franks and the early medieval town
In the fifth century, Roman rule on the upper Rhine collapsed. The Alemanni settled on both banks of the river, and the region came under the rule of the Franks after Clovis defeated the Alemanni… Read more Basel · OriginsThe river as a trade route: from Roman boatmen to the Rhine ports
The Romans organised navigation on the Rhine, which had carried goods since prehistoric times, on a large scale. Read more Basel · OriginsArchaeology, heritage and the law
The history of the Basel region is also a history of what has been found in its soil. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Roman legacy and the modern financial centre
Several threads link the Roman period with the modern Basel financial centre. Some are direct. Read more Basel · OriginsWhat geography teaches the financial centre
It may seem far-fetched to begin a book on a modern financial centre with Celtic ramparts and Roman silver plates. Yet several lessons of the early history of the site continue to shape Basel. Read more Basel · OriginsBasel and Geneva: two beginnings compared
The companion volume on Geneva opens with a scene from the same year in which the Rauraci left their territory: in 58 BC, Caesar had the bridge over the Rhône at Geneva cut to stop the Helvetii, and… Read more Basel · OriginsThe Bishop's City: Lordship, Coinage and the Medieval Urban Economy — conclusion
The bishops of Basel ruled their city from the eleventh century to the late fourteenth century. Read more Basel · OriginsThe prince-bishop as lord of the city
For most of the Middle Ages, Basel was the city of its bishop. The bishop was its spiritual head and its temporal lord. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Minster and the economy of the Church
Before turning to the bishop's money, it is worth recalling the scale of the ecclesiastical economy in the medieval city. Read more Basel · OriginsThe bishop's mint
The right to coin money was one of the most important and profitable regalian rights. Read more Basel · OriginsFrom the bishop's coinage to the Rappen monetary union
The bishop's right of coinage passed to the city in the fourteenth century. In 1373, the bishop pledged the mint to the city of Basel, which from then on exercised the right of coinage. Read more Basel · OriginsJews, Cahorsins and the question of credit
The history of credit in medieval Basel cannot be written without the history of the Jewish community, and that history includes one of the darkest episodes of the city's past. Read more Basel · OriginsThe rise of the citizens
While the bishop ruled, the citizens organised. The merchants, craftsmen and landowners of the city formed associations, obtained privileges and gradually acquired a share in the government of the… Read more Basel · OriginsBishop Heinrich von Thun and the Rhine bridge
The most important economic act of the episcopal period was the construction of the bridge over the Rhine. Read more Basel · OriginsKleinbasel: a second town and a second economy
Kleinbasel, founded by the bishop on the right bank after the construction of the bridge, developed as a town of its own. Read more Basel · OriginsThe earthquake of 1356
On 18 October 1356, Basel was struck by the strongest earthquake in the recorded history of Central Europe north of the Alps. Read more Basel · OriginsMarkets, measures and the regulation of trade
The right to hold a market was, like the right of coinage, a regalian right that the bishops had received from the crown. The market was a place and an institution. Read more Basel · OriginsThe nobles, the Habsburgs and the Evil Carnival
The emancipation of the citizens from the bishop was complicated by the presence of a third power: the nobility. Read more Basel · OriginsSources for a financial history of medieval Basel
The historian of finance in medieval Basel works with an exceptionally rich archive. Read more Basel · OriginsThe bishop's debts and the transfer of rights
The fourteenth century was a period of financial crisis for the bishopric of Basel. Read more Basel · OriginsBetween bishop and Empire: the status of the city
The legal status of Basel at the end of the fourteenth century was ambiguous in a way characteristic of the episcopal cities of the Empire. Formally, the bishop remained the lord of the city. Read more Basel · OriginsThe episcopal legacy
After the bishop's rule over the city of Basel ended in the fifteenth century, the Reformation of 1529 severed the last ties between the city and its bishop. Read more Basel · OriginsMoney, Credit and Public Finance in the Late Medieval City — conclusion
In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the citizens of Basel built the financial institutions of a self-governing city. Read more Basel · OriginsA city of ten thousand
At the end of the Middle Ages, Basel was a city of about ten thousand inhabitants. Read more Basel · OriginsThe merchant's monetary world
Before examining the finances of the city, it is necessary to describe the monetary world in which its merchants and officials operated. Read more Basel · OriginsThe municipal treasury
The acquisition of the bishop's rights gave the city revenues and obligations that required a financial administration. Read more Basel · OriginsRevenues: the Ungeld and other taxes
The largest source of revenue of the city was the Ungeld, an indirect tax on the consumption of wine, grain and other goods. Read more Basel · OriginsExpenditure: walls, wars and territories
The expenditure of the city was dominated by three items. The first was defence. After the earthquake of 1356, the city built a new outer wall that enclosed the suburbs that had grown up outside the… Read more Basel · OriginsThe public debt and the annuity market
The most striking feature of the finances of late medieval Basel, as revealed by Harms's study, is the size of the public debt. Read more Basel · OriginsThe guild economy and the regulation of work
The guilds that governed Basel in the fifteenth century also governed its economy. Read more Basel · OriginsSalt, wine and grain: the commodity trades
Three commodities dominated the trade and the public finances of late medieval Basel: salt, wine and grain. Read more Basel · OriginsPoverty, charity and the hospital
The medieval city was also a community of mutual assistance, whose institutions of charity were among its most important holders of capital. Read more Basel · OriginsPrivate credit: rents on houses and merchant partnerships
The rent was also the principal instrument of private credit. Citizens who needed capital, to buy a house, to set up a workshop or to finance a trading venture, sold rents secured on their real… Read more Basel · OriginsCrises: plague, famine and war
The financial institutions of late medieval Basel were tested by a series of crises. Read more Basel · OriginsAccounts, writing and the culture of the record
The financial institutions of the late medieval city depended on writing. The municipal accounts, the registers of rents, the records of the Kaufhaus, the accounts of the Stadtwechsel, the protocols… Read more Basel · OriginsThe Kaufhaus: the city's warehouse and customs house
In the late fourteenth century, the city established a central warehouse and customs house, the Kaufhaus. Read more Basel · OriginsThe municipal exchange of 1504
The financial institution that crowned the medieval development of Basel was established shortly after the city's accession to the Confederation. Read more Basel · OriginsThe rural territory as a portfolio
The rural territory that the city acquired in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries deserves a closer look from a financial perspective. Read more Basel · OriginsCredit, trust and civic virtue
The financial institutions of late medieval Basel, the municipal treasury, the annuity market, the Kaufhaus and the Stadtwechsel, rested on a common foundation: trust. Read more Basel · OriginsBasel and Geneva compared: municipal finance and fairs
The comparison with Geneva, which the companion volume examines, shows different paths to the same destination. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Council of Basel (1431–1449) as a Financial Event — conclusion
The Council of Basel, which met from 1431 to 1449, brought several thousand visitors to a city of ten thousand inhabitants and made it for almost two decades the centre of the Latin Church. Read more Basel · OriginsA general council in a provincial city
In the summer of 1431, the city of Basel became the meeting place of a general council of the Latin Church. Read more Basel · OriginsThe conciliar movement and the choice of Basel
The Council of Basel was the product of the conciliar movement, which had emerged from the crisis of the Great Western Schism. Read more Basel · OriginsThe course of the Council
The Council pursued three main objectives: the reconciliation of the Hussites, the reform of the Church and the union with the Greek Church. Read more Basel · OriginsThe economy of a council
The arrival of a general council transformed the economy of Basel. At its height in the mid-1430s, the Council brought several thousand people to the city: prelates with their households, envoys with… Read more Basel · OriginsSafe conduct, protection and the neutrality of the host
The first condition of any international assembly is the safety of its participants. The Council of Basel met in the shadow of a notorious breach of this condition. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Council as a market for legal services
A general council was, among other things, a great court of law and a market for legal services. Read more Basel · OriginsThe geography of payments
The participants of the Council came from all over Latin Christendom: from France, the Empire, Italy, Spain, Portugal, England, Scotland, Poland, Hungary, Bohemia and Scandinavia. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Church as a financial system
To understand the financial stakes of the Council, it is necessary to recall the scale of the financial system that the papacy had built in the fourteenth century. Read more Basel · OriginsThe finances of the Council itself
A general council was an expensive institution. It had to pay for its chancery, its courts, its envoys and its administration. Read more Basel · OriginsItalian bankers in Basel
The Council brought the Italian banking houses to Basel. The papacy was the largest international financial organisation of the Middle Ages. Read more Basel · OriginsPaper, scribes and the preparation of printing
The Council was an enormous consumer of paper. Its chancery issued thousands of documents, its sessions produced protocols and decrees, its theologians wrote treatises, and its members corresponded… Read more Basel · OriginsAeneas Silvius Piccolomini and the image of Basel
Among the participants of the Council was a young Sienese humanist, Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini, who came to Basel in 1432 as secretary of a cardinal and later served the Council and Felix V in… Read more Basel · OriginsFelix V, Savoy and Geneva
The election of Amadeus VIII of Savoy as Felix V connects the Council of Basel with the history of Geneva. Read more Basel · OriginsConciliarism and the constitution of international institutions
The Council of Basel failed, but its ideas survived. The conciliar theory, which held that the Church as a whole, represented by a general council, was superior to the pope, was one of the sources of… Read more Basel · OriginsHosting an international institution: a balance sheet
The experience of the Council allows an early balance sheet of the benefits and costs of hosting an international institution. The benefits were immediate and visible. Read more Basel · OriginsBasel after the Council
The years that followed the departure of the Council were difficult for Basel. The Armagnac invasion of 1444 had devastated the surroundings of the city. Read more Basel · OriginsWhat the Council left behind
When the Council left Basel in 1448, the city returned to its provincial dimension. The visitors departed, the revenues from lodgings and consumption declined, and the Italian bankers moved on. Read more Basel · OriginsUniversity, Fair Privilege and Confederation (1460–1501) — conclusion
In the four decades from 1460 to 1501, Basel made three decisions that defined its future. Read more Basel · OriginsThree decisions that shaped a city
In the four decades that followed the Council, Basel took three decisions that defined its future. In 1460, it opened a university, the first on the territory of present-day Switzerland. Read more Basel · OriginsThe bull of Pius II
The initiative to found a university in Basel came from the city. In 1459, the council sent a petition to Pope Pius II, the former Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini who had known Basel as a young secretary… Read more Basel · OriginsFinancing a university
A medieval university was expensive. It had to pay its professors, provide lecture halls and lodgings for students, maintain a library and organise examinations and ceremonies. Read more Basel · OriginsLaw at the university
The faculty of law of the University of Basel taught both canon law and Roman law from its foundation. Read more Basel · OriginsThe beginnings of printing
The years following the foundation of the university saw the arrival in Basel of the art of printing with movable type, invented by Johannes Gutenberg in Mainz around 1450. Read more Basel · OriginsSebastian Brant and the ship of fools
The first great literary success of Basel printing was a book about folly that contained a critique of money. Read more Basel · OriginsThe imperial fair privilege of 1471
In 1471, the Emperor Frederick III granted Basel the privilege of holding two annual fairs. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Burgundian Wars and the trial of Peter von Hagenbach
The second half of the fifteenth century was dominated, in the region of the Upper Rhine, by the ambitions of the Duke of Burgundy, Charles the Bold. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Swabian War and the Peace of Basel
The last war that preceded Basel's accession to the Confederation was the Swabian War of 1499, fought between the Confederates and the Swabian League, supported by the Emperor Maximilian I. Read more Basel · OriginsThe accession of 1501
The Swabian War demonstrated to Basel that it could not remain indefinitely between the Empire and the Confederation. Read more Basel · OriginsThe choice between Empire and Confederation
The decision of 1501 was not self-evident and was debated within the city. Basel had belonged to the Empire for five centuries. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Upper Rhine network after 1501
The accession to the Confederation did not sever Basel's ties with the Upper Rhine cities. Read more Basel · OriginsWhat accession meant for the economy of Basel
The accession to the Confederation changed the economic position of Basel in several ways. Read more Basel · OriginsPensions, mercenaries and the moral debate
The accession to the Confederation brought Basel into a political system in which the sale of military service was a central economic activity. Read more Basel · OriginsThe Rhine border takes shape
The accession of 1501 transformed the meaning of the border around Basel. Before 1501, the city was surrounded by territories that belonged, like the city itself, to the Empire: the Habsburg… Read more Basel · OriginsThe Basel of 1501
At the moment of its accession, Basel was a city of about ten thousand inhabitants, governed by a council dominated by the guilds, with a university, a flourishing printing industry, paper mills, an… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationPrinting as Capital-Intensive Enterprise: Amerbach, Froben, Petri — conclusion
The printing industry of Basel, which flourished from the 1470s to the middle of the sixteenth century, was the first industry of the city that required capital, credit and international distribution… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationA new industry in an old city
Around 1500, Basel was home to one of the most productive printing industries in Europe. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe economics of the printed book
The production of a printed book required a combination of inputs that no single craft provided. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationGutenberg's lesson: the financier and the inventor
The history of printing began with a lawsuit about money. Johannes Gutenberg, who developed the technique of printing with movable metal type in Mainz around 1450, financed his work with loans from… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationJohann Amerbach: the scholar-printer
The first great printer of Basel was Johann Amerbach, born around 1440 in Amorbach in Franconia, from which his name derives. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe partnership of the three Johns
Amerbach's most ambitious project was a complete edition of the works of Jerome, the translator of the Latin Bible and one of the four Latin Fathers of the Church. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationJohann Froben and the business of humanism
Johann Froben was a printer of exceptional skill and a publisher of vision. After Amerbach's death, he became the leading printer of Basel. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationAdam and Heinrich Petri: the publishers of the Reformation and of the world
The Petri family formed another dynasty of Basel printers. Johann Petri, Amerbach's partner, was succeeded by his nephew Adam Petri, who became one of the principal printers of the early Reformation. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationJohannes Oporinus: the risks of the trade
Not all Basel printers were as successful as Froben and Petri. Johannes Oporinus, a scholar who had been secretary to Paracelsus and professor of Greek at the university, became a printer in the… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe printing workshop: labour, wages and conflict
A printing shop of the sixteenth century was a workshop of a new kind. It gathered, under the direction of a master, workers with different skills who performed different tasks in a coordinated… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationCredit in the book trade
The account books and correspondence of the Basel printers reveal a dense web of credit relationships. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationWomen in the printing business
The history of Basel printing, like that of printing elsewhere, includes women who ran printing houses, usually as widows of printers. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationHans Holbein the Younger and the portrait of a money changer
Among the artists who worked for the Basel printers, one achieved a fame that far exceeds the history of printing. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe libraries and collections of Basel
The printing industry and the humanist culture of the sixteenth century left Basel with an exceptional heritage of books and collections. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationCensorship and the regulation of printing
The printing industry was, from the outset, a regulated industry. The authorities of the sixteenth century recognised the power of the printed word to spread ideas, both orthodox and heretical, and… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationPaper, type and the supply chain
The printing industry depended on a supply chain that extended beyond the city. The paper mills of the St. Alban valley supplied a large part of the paper used by Basel printers. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe fairs of Frankfurt and the distribution of books
The principal market for Basel books was the Frankfurt fair, held twice a year, in spring and autumn. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe pamphlet economy of the Reformation
The Reformation transformed the market for printed matter. Alongside the large folio editions of the Church Fathers and the classics, which required years of preparation and large capital, a new… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationBasel's place in the European book trade
By the standards of the sixteenth century, Basel was a leading printing centre of the German-speaking world, alongside Cologne, Strasbourg, Nuremberg, Augsburg, Leipzig and Wittenberg. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationPrinting and the formation of capital
The printing industry of Basel reached its peak in the first half of the sixteenth century and declined in the second half, when religious conflicts, censorship, competition from other centres and… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe printer as intermediary
One further aspect of the printing industry deserves attention in a book about a financial centre. The printer was an intermediary. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationErasmus and the Humanist Republic of Letters — conclusion
Erasmus lived in Basel from 1521 to 1529 and again from 1535 until his death in 1536. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe most famous resident of Basel
Of all the people who have lived in Basel, none was more famous in his own time than Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationWhy Basel?
Erasmus had lived in Paris, Oxford, Cambridge, London, Venice, Rome, Louvain and other cities before he settled in Basel. His choice of Basel requires explanation. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe republic of letters as a network
The humanists of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries called their community the respublica litteraria, the republic of letters. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationErasmus's income
Erasmus had no inherited wealth, no permanent office and no fixed salary for most of his life. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Adagia: a knowledge product and its revisions
Erasmus's most commercially successful work was a collection of classical proverbs with commentary, the Adagia. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Fugger, the indulgence and the price of an election
Erasmus lived in the age of the Fugger. The connection between the great Augsburg banking house and the events that shaped his life shows how deeply finance was intertwined with the politics and… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationTransferring money across borders: Erasmus Schets
The payments that Erasmus received from England, the Low Countries and elsewhere had to be transferred to Basel. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationErasmus on money, war and princes
Erasmus wrote extensively on the duties of rulers. His views on taxation, coinage and war are directly relevant to the history of public finance. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Praise of Folly and the satire of greed
Erasmus's most famous work, the Moriae encomium or Praise of Folly, was written in England in 1509 at the house of Thomas More and first printed in Paris in 1511. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationCouriers, posts and the speed of information
The republic of letters and the world of commerce depended on the same infrastructure: the transport of letters. In the early sixteenth century, letters travelled by several means. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationErasmus's household and the cost of living
Erasmus lived in Basel in the style of a scholar of standing. He rented houses, first in the property of Froben and later a house of his own choosing, maintained servants and secretaries, the famuli,… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationBetween the confessions
The Reformation confronted Erasmus with a choice that he tried to avoid. Many of the early reformers had been his admirers and considered him a precursor. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationErasmus's will and the Erasmus foundation
When Erasmus died in Basel in 1536, he left a considerable estate, the fruit of decades of pensions, gifts and payments. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe humanist circle of Basel
Erasmus was the centre of a circle of scholars who lived in Basel or passed through the city. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationManners, schooling and the education of merchants' sons
Erasmus was also an educator, who wrote several of his most successful books for the instruction of the young. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationAuthor and publisher: a relationship without a contract
The relationship between Erasmus and Froben was never formalised in a written contract that has survived. It rested on mutual interest, personal trust and the customs of the book trade. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationErasmus in the memory of Basel
Basel has kept the memory of Erasmus in many forms. His tomb in the Minster is visited by admirers from all over the world. The house in which he died, zum Luft, on the Bäumleingasse, bears a plaque. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationLegal humanism and the renewal of jurisprudence
The humanist movement transformed the study of law. The medieval jurists had studied Roman law through the glosses and commentaries accumulated since the twelfth century. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Reformation of 1529: Oecolampadius and the New Civic Order — conclusion
The Reformation of 1529 was imposed on the council of Basel by the armed guilds, after years of hesitation. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationA revolution by the guilds
On 9 February 1529, armed members of the guilds of Basel gathered on the market square, forced the council to accept their demands and then went through the churches of the city, tearing down images,… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe path to reform
The ideas of the Reformation reached Basel early. The printing houses of the city, as Chapter I showed, reprinted Luther's writings from 1519 onwards and spread them throughout the Upper German and… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationJohannes Oecolampadius
The leader of the Reformation in Basel was Johannes Oecolampadius, whose name is a Greek rendering of his German name Hausschein, or perhaps Heussgen. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationFebruary 1529
The decisive crisis came in the winter of 1528 to 1529. The adoption of the Reformation by Bern in 1528 changed the balance of power in the Confederation and encouraged the reform party in Basel. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Reformation Ordinance of 1 April 1529
The council gave the new order a legal form in the Reformation Ordinance of 1 April 1529. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationConstitutional consequences
The Reformation changed the constitution of Basel. The exclusion of the Catholic councillors and the pressure of the guilds strengthened the role of the guilds in the government of the city. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe secularisation of church property
The most important economic consequence of the Reformation was the transfer of church property to the city. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe end of payments to Rome
The Reformation also ended the financial flows between Basel and Rome. Before 1529, the clergy of Basel paid annates, fees for dispensations and other charges to the papal curia, while the citizens… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationPoor relief and the new social order
The reformers attached great importance to the care of the poor. They criticised the medieval system of charity, which relied on alms given by individuals to beggars, on the charitable activities of… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationMoral discipline and economic life
The Reformation Ordinance and the subsequent moral mandates regulated the private lives of the citizens in detail. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationAnabaptists and the limits of reform
The Reformation in Basel, as in Zurich and Bern, had a radical wing that the authorities suppressed. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe marriage court and the law of family property
One of the most lasting institutions created by the Reformation was the marriage court, the Ehegericht. Before 1529, marriage was a sacrament. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationSchools and the investment in education
The reformers believed that every Christian should be able to read the Bible, and that the church needed educated pastors capable of interpreting it. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Reformed alliance
The Reformation created new alliances between the Protestant cities. In 1528 and 1529, Zurich, Bern, Basel, St Gallen, Schaffhausen, Biel, Mulhouse and the Imperial city of Constance concluded a… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationTithes, rents and the countryside after 1529
The Reformation changed the religious life of the countryside of Basel, but it did not free the peasants from the dues they owed. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Confessions of Basel
The Reformed church of Basel defined its doctrine in a confession of faith. The First Basel Confession was drafted by Oecolampadius, completed after his death by his successor Oswald Myconius and… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationBasel, Zurich and Geneva: three Reformations compared
The Reformation of Basel can be compared with those of Zurich and Geneva, the two other Swiss cities whose Reformations shaped their later role as financial centres. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Reformation and the guild economy
The Reformation strengthened the guilds politically, but it did not change their economic role. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Minster after the Reformation
The Minster of Basel, stripped of its images and altars in 1529, became the principal church of the Reformed city. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationFrom state church to public-law church
The integration of church and state that the Reformation created in Basel lasted for almost four centuries. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Reformation and the economic culture of Basel
The Reformation of 1529 left a lasting imprint on the economic culture of Basel. It transferred church property to civic administration and established a tradition of public endowments for education… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationCalvin's Institutio (Basel 1536) and the Reformed Ethics of Credit — conclusion
Jean Calvin, a French refugee, wrote the first edition of his Institutio in Basel, where it was printed in March 1536 by Thomas Platter and Balthasar Lasius. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationA refugee writes a book
In January 1535, a young French lawyer and theologian arrived in Basel as a refugee. Jean Calvin, born in 1509 in Noyon in Picardy, had studied law at Orléans and Bourges and humanities in Paris. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Institutio as a Basel product
The Institutio of 1536 was a product of the Basel printing industry and of the refugee culture of the city. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe lawyer as theologian
Calvin was trained as a lawyer before he became a theologian, a training that shaped his thought. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe career of a book
The Institutio of 1536 was the first stage of a book that grew with its author. Calvin revised and expanded it throughout his life. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe problem of interest
To understand the significance of Calvin's ethics of credit, it is necessary to recall the doctrine he inherited. The prohibition of usury, which Part A has already mentioned, had deep roots. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationLuther, Zwingli and the reformers on interest
The first generation of reformers did not abolish the prohibition of usury. Martin Luther condemned usury in several writings, among them his Sermon on Usury of 1519 and 1520 and his treatise On… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationCalvin's letter on usury
Calvin's most important statement on interest is a letter written around 1545, probably to his friend Claude de Sachins, who had asked his opinion on the lawfulness of lending at interest. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationGeneva's legislation on interest
Calvin's views were translated into law in Geneva. The companion volume describes how the Genevan authorities fixed a maximum rate of interest, which was set at five per cent in the 1530s and raised… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationBasel's practice between Zurich and Geneva
The practice of Basel in matters of interest in the sixteenth century was close to that of Geneva and Zurich, but with its own emphasis. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe instruments of the Reformed merchant
The acceptance of moderate interest by the reformers did not change the instruments of credit overnight. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe price of money through the centuries
The five per cent that the councils of Basel and Geneva fixed as the normal rate for rents and loans in the sixteenth century was the price of money in a world of scarce capital, high risk and… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationComparative ethics of interest: the Islamic prohibition
The debate on interest is not limited to the Christian tradition. Islamic law prohibits riba, a term that covers interest on loans and certain forms of unjust enrichment in exchange. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationFrom Calvin to Weber
In 1904 and 1905, the German sociologist Max Weber published an essay that has shaped the discussion of the relationship between religion and economic life ever since: The Protestant Ethic and the… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationSebastian Castellio and the question of tolerance
The Reformed world was not a world of tolerance. Calvin's Geneva executed the Spanish physician and theologian Michael Servetus for heresy in October 1553. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationExit, voice and the mobility of capital
The Institutio was written by a refugee and addressed to a king who persecuted his fellow believers. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationNotaries, courts and the documentation of credit
The Reformed ethics of credit was applied in practice through the institutions of the civic legal order: the notaries who drew up contracts, the registers in which rents and pledges were recorded,… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationStewardship and the ethics of wealth
Calvin's ethics of wealth went beyond the question of interest. In the Institutio and in his commentaries and sermons, he developed a doctrine of stewardship: wealth was a gift of God, entrusted to… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Basel that Calvin knew
When Calvin arrived in Basel in January 1535, the city had been Reformed for six years. The images had been removed from the churches, the mass abolished, the monasteries dissolved. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe ethics of credit in modern corporate governance
The Reformed ethics of credit, with its emphasis on moderation, fairness and the common good, has echoes in the modern debates on the governance of financial institutions. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationBasel and Geneva: two paths from the Institutio
The Institutio was printed in Basel and applied in Geneva. The two cities followed different paths in the following centuries, although both remained Reformed. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationReligious Refugees and the Silk Ribbon Industry — conclusion
In the second half of the sixteenth century and the first half of the seventeenth, Basel received refugees from Italy, France and the Low Countries. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationA city of refuge
In the second half of the sixteenth century and the first half of the seventeenth, Basel received waves of religious refugees. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Italian refugees
The first significant group of refugees came from Italy. In the 1540s, the reorganisation of the Roman Inquisition and the failure of attempts at reconciliation with the Protestants led many Italians… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Huguenots and the Netherlanders
The second and larger wave of refugees came from France and the Low Countries in the second half of the sixteenth century. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Bernoulli family
The Bernoulli family illustrates the path of a refugee family from commerce to learning. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe admission of refugees: a selective policy
The city of Basel did not admit refugees without conditions. Its policy combined humanitarian and religious motives, the duty to help persecuted fellow believers, with economic calculation and the… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationDavid Joris: the wealthy stranger
The story of the most famous refugee of sixteenth-century Basel is a cautionary tale about identity, wealth and trust. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe origins of the silk industry
The most important economic contribution of the refugees was the silk industry. Silk had been a luxury good in medieval Europe, imported from the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic world and later… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe engine loom and the conflict with the guilds
The decisive innovation in the ribbon industry was the engine loom, known in German as the Bandmühle or Kunststuhl. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe ribbon weavers' villages
The putting-out system transformed the countryside of Basel. In the villages of the rural territory, in particular in the valleys of the Jura that today form the districts of Waldenburg, Sissach and… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationCapital, skills and networks: what the refugees brought
The contribution of the refugees to the economy of Basel can be summarised in three words: capital, skills and networks. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe Thirty Years' War and the neutrality of Basel
The refugees of the early seventeenth century arrived in a Europe that was sliding into the most destructive war of its early modern history. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationJohann Rudolf Wettstein and the Peace of Westphalia
The Thirty Years' War ended with the Peace of Westphalia, concluded at Münster and Osnabrück in 1648. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationSilk waste and the long life of an industry
The silk ribbon industry was the most prominent but not the only branch of the silk industry that the refugees brought to Basel. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationRefugee capital and the culture of discretion
The refugees who came to Basel with their wealth had good reasons to be discreet. They had fled from rulers who had confiscated or threatened to confiscate their property, often after transferring… Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationRefugee families and the origins of Basel banking
Several of the refugee families of Basel would, in the following centuries, move from trade and industry into banking. The path was gradual. Read more Basel · Humanism, Printing and ReformationThe modern city of immigrants
Basel has remained a city of immigrants. In the nineteenth century, workers from the Black Forest, Alsace and the Swiss countryside came to work in its factories, while entrepreneurs from Germany and… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Silk Ribbon Manufacturers and the Putting-Out System — conclusion
The silk ribbon industry was the leading industry of Basel from the late seventeenth century to the late nineteenth. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe leading industry of Basel
For almost two centuries, from the late seventeenth century to the late nineteenth, the silk ribbon industry was the leading industry of Basel. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe chain of production
The production of a silk ribbon involved a long chain of operations, each requiring specific skills and each adding value to the material. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe putting-out system
The putting-out system, known in German as the Verlagssystem, was the dominant form of industrial organisation in Europe before the factory. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe weavers and their dependence
The rural weavers, the Posamenter, lived in a condition of economic dependence that historians have described in various terms. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldMarkets and fashion
The market for silk ribbons was a market of fashion. Ribbons were worn on hats, dresses, bonnets, shoes and in the hair; they decorated uniforms, military insignia and ceremonial garments; Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe financing of the ribbon industry
Since the ribbon industry required large amounts of capital, its financing is the key to understanding the emergence of banking in Basel. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe palaces of the ribbon lords
The wealth of the ribbon merchants is visible in the architecture of Basel. In the eighteenth century, the leading families built town houses of a splendour that contrasted with the modesty that the… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldDyes, chemistry and the path to the chemical industry
The ribbon industry's need for dyes created a trade and a craft that would prepare the most important industry of modern Basel. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe books of a ribbon house
The account books of the Basel ribbon houses, several of which are preserved in the State Archives and in the Swiss Economic Archives in Basel, show the complexity of the business. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Paris fashion system and the Basel designers
The dependence of the Basel ribbon industry on fashion made the design of ribbons a central activity. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldWages, prices and the ribbon cycle
The income of the weavers and the profits of the merchants depended on a cycle that combined the seasons of fashion, the harvests of silk and the conditions of the export markets. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldCrises and competition
The history of the Basel ribbon industry was punctuated by crises. The wars of the French Revolution and of Napoleon disrupted trade with France and the rest of Europe. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe merchants' directorate and the Basel post
The merchants of Basel organised themselves not only in the guilds but also in a body that represented their common commercial interests. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe raw silk trade and its risks
The supply of raw silk was the first link in the chain of the ribbon industry and one of its principal sources of risk. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldPatterns, piracy and the protection of design
The success of a ribbon merchant depended on his patterns. A new design, a new combination of colours or a new weave could create a fashion and bring large orders. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldNapoleon, the Continental System and the border trade
The wars of the French Revolution and of Napoleon had profound effects on the trade of Basel. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldFrom home looms to factories
In the second half of the nineteenth century, the ribbon industry of Basel gradually moved from home work to factories. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe ribbon industry and the financial centre
The silk ribbon industry was the matrix of the Basel financial centre. It created the capital from which the private banks of Basel emerged. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldHome work, platform work and the regulation of dependent labour
The putting-out system raises a question that has returned in the twenty-first century in a new form: the legal status of workers who are formally independent but economically dependent on a single… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldPatrician Families and the Culture of Discretion — conclusion
The Daig, the old patrician families of Basel, formed a social elite of merchants, manufacturers, bankers, scholars and public servants, connected by marriage and kinship over centuries. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe dough of Basel
In Basel, the old families that have shaped the city for centuries are known collectively as the Daig, a word of the Basel dialect that means dough. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldKinship and marriage
The families of the Daig were connected by marriage to a degree that is difficult to imagine today. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe management of family wealth
The families of the Daig accumulated wealth over generations and developed practices for its management and transmission. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldGuardianship and the administration of other people's property
The management of other people's property was a regular task of the Basel elite long before it became the business of banks. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldPublic office and civic duty
The families of the Daig dominated the government of Basel until the democratisation of the nineteenth century. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Enlightenment in Basel: Isaak Iselin
The eighteenth century brought the ideas of the Enlightenment to Basel, where one of its most important representatives in Switzerland was a Basel patrician. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldPietism and the Christentumsgesellschaft
Alongside the rational Enlightenment of Iselin, Basel was a centre of Pietism, the movement of religious renewal that emphasised personal conversion, devotion, Bible reading and practical piety. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldCountry estates and the landscape of wealth
The families of the Daig invested a part of their wealth in country estates in the surroundings of the city. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldWomen of the Daig
The history of the Daig is usually written as a history of men: merchants, magistrates, professors and pastors. The women of the patrician families played a role that was less visible but essential. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Daig and the federal state
The creation of the Swiss federal state in 1848 changed the political framework in which the Daig operated. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldClosed networks and the economics of trust
The kinship network of the Daig raises a question that economists and sociologists have studied in many contexts: the role of closed networks in the organisation of trade and finance. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe culture of discretion
The most characteristic feature of the Daig is its culture of discretion. The old families of Basel are known for their understatement. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Helvetic Revolution and the end of the old order
The old order of Basel, with its guild constitution and its patrician government, came to an end in 1798 with the Helvetic Revolution. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe architecture of discretion
The old town of Basel, on the hill of the Minster and along the streets that descend to the Rhine and the market square, is a landscape shaped by the Daig. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldFasnacht and the social life of the city
The social life of the Daig was, and remains, bound up with the institutions of the city: the guilds, which continue to exist as social corporations; Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldPhilanthropy: Christoph Merian and the civic foundations
A significant part of the wealth of the Daig was given to the city. The tradition of civic philanthropy, which goes back to the medieval foundations and to the Erasmus foundation of 1536, reached a… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldJacob Burckhardt and the Basel mind
The intellectual culture of the Daig produced, in the nineteenth century, one of the great historians of Europe. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Daig today
The Daig still exists, although its role has changed. The democratisation of politics in the nineteenth century, the growth of the city, the arrival of new populations and the transformation of the… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldFamily ownership in the modern Basel economy
The tradition of family ownership, which the Daig embodied, remains a feature of the modern Basel economy. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldDiscretion and the modern law of privacy
The culture of discretion of the Daig has its counterpart in the modern law of privacy. The Swiss Federal Constitution guarantees the right to privacy, including the protection of personal data. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldFrom Trade Credit to Banking: the Merchant-Banking Houses — conclusion
In the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the merchant houses of Basel became banks. As the municipal exchange declined, private houses took over its functions. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe merchant becomes a banker
There is no single date at which banking began in Basel. The medieval money changers of the Hausgenossen, the municipal exchange of 1504, the printers who extended and received credit, the ribbon… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe decline of the municipal exchange
The municipal exchange, the Stadtwechsel, founded in 1504, served the city and its merchants for more than two centuries. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldBasel capital abroad
In the eighteenth century, the merchants and patricians of Basel accumulated more capital than they could invest profitably in the city and its region. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe commission and forwarding business
Basel's position at the junction of routes between France, Germany, Switzerland and Italy made it a centre of the commission and forwarding business. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe first private banks
By the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth, several Basel houses had become primarily banking houses. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldCorrespondents: the network of the Basel houses
A private bank of the early nineteenth century was only as good as its correspondents. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldBills of exchange and the discount business
The discounting of bills of exchange was the core business of the early Basel private banks and the principal instrument of short-term credit for the merchants and manufacturers of the city. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldBanknotes before the National Bank
Before the foundation of the Swiss National Bank in 1907, banknotes in Switzerland were issued by private and cantonal banks. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldMoney in the age of revolution: the franc and the cantonal coinages
The Helvetic Republic of 1798 introduced, for the first time, a single Swiss currency: the Swiss franc, divided into ten batzen or one hundred rappen. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Basel stock exchange
The trade in securities in Basel was organised informally for most of the nineteenth century, in the offices of the private banks and in meetings of brokers and merchants. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe legal form of the private bank
The early private banks were organised as partnerships, in which the partners were personally and without limit liable for the debts of the firm. This unlimited liability was a signal of trust. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe partnership agreement: governance of a family bank
The governance of a family bank was defined by the partnership agreement, the contract by which the partners regulated their relationship. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldPrivate banks and the political order after 1833
The division of the canton of Basel in 1833, which Part D examines, had consequences for the private banks of the city. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe savings banks and the broader public
The private banks of Basel served the elite: merchants, manufacturers, patrician families and institutions. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldCredit information and the business of reputation
A bank that lends or discounts bills needs information about the creditworthiness of its borrowers. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe taxation of wealth in the nineteenth century
The wealth that the merchants and bankers of Basel accumulated was subject to taxation. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldLending to the public sector
The private banks of Basel also lent to public bodies: the canton, the city, the municipalities of the region and, increasingly, other Swiss cantons and foreign states. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe culture of risk
The private bankers of Basel developed a culture of risk that reflected their situation. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldPrivate wealth management as a service
The management of family wealth, which the patricians of Basel had long practised for themselves and their relatives, became in the nineteenth century a service that the private banks offered to… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldTowards the railway age
In the 1840s and 1850s, a new capital need appeared that exceeded the resources of individual private banks: the railways. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldBasel and the Atlantic Economy: Colonial Entanglements — conclusion
Switzerland had no colonies, but Swiss merchants, investors, manufacturers, soldiers and officials participated in the colonial economy and the Atlantic slave trade. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldA landlocked city in a maritime world
Switzerland never had colonies, a navy or a port on the ocean. For a long time, this fact was taken to mean that Switzerland had no part in the colonial history of Europe, including the Atlantic… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe colonial goods trade
The most widespread form of Basel's involvement in the colonial economy was the trade in colonial goods. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldSpices, sugar and the Basel household
The colonial trade shaped the daily life of Basel in ways that are still visible. The Basler Läckerli, the spiced honey biscuits that are one of the culinary specialities of the city, are made with… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe geography of the Atlantic trade
The Atlantic slave trade is often described as a triangular trade. Ships left European ports, among them Nantes, Bordeaux, La Rochelle, Liverpool, Bristol, London and Amsterdam, loaded with trade… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldChristoph Burckhardt & Cie and the slave trade from Nantes
The most thoroughly documented case of direct participation of a Basel merchant house in the Atlantic slave trade is that of Christoph Burckhardt & Cie. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldInsurance, credit and the dehumanisation of persons
The financing of the slave trade relied on the instruments of eighteenth-century finance, which treated enslaved people as property. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldPlantation loans and the securitisation of slavery
In the second half of the eighteenth century, Dutch bankers developed a financial instrument that allowed investors throughout Europe to lend to the planters of the Dutch colonies in the Caribbean,… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldSaint-Domingue and the price of freedom
The French colony of Saint-Domingue, the western part of the island of Hispaniola, was in the late eighteenth century the richest colony in the world, producing a large share of the sugar and coffee… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldCompensation for the owners
When Britain abolished slavery in its colonies in 1833, it paid compensation to the slave owners. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldArchives and historical responsibility
The history of Basel's involvement in the slave trade could be written because the archives of the merchant houses survived. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldIndiennes: Swiss textiles and the African trade
The slave trade depended on trade goods that were exchanged for enslaved people on the coast of West Africa. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldSwiss servants of the colonial powers
Swiss citizens also served the colonial powers directly. Swiss officers and soldiers served in the armies of France, the Netherlands, Britain and other powers, some of them in the colonies. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldCotton and the Swiss textile industry
The cotton industry, which became the leading industry of eastern Switzerland in the nineteenth century, depended on raw cotton produced in large part by enslaved labour in the southern United… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldSwiss capital and the chartered companies
The great chartered trading companies of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the Dutch East India Company, the Dutch West India Company, the English East India Company, the Royal African… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldSwiss consuls and merchant networks overseas
In the nineteenth century, the Swiss Confederation, which had no colonies and a very limited diplomatic service, relied on honorary consuls, usually Swiss merchants established abroad, to represent… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldAbolition and its Swiss echoes
The movement for the abolition of the slave trade and of slavery, which began in England in the 1780s and achieved the abolition of the British slave trade in 1807 and of slavery in the British… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldRemembering the colonial past in Basel
Since the early 2000s, the colonial entanglements of Switzerland have become a subject of research and public debate. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldColonial collections in the museums of Basel
The colonial past of Basel is also present in its museums. The Museum der Kulturen Basel, founded in the nineteenth century and today one of the largest ethnographic museums in Europe, holds hundreds… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldSupply chains and the modern law of responsibility
The history of Basel's colonial entanglements has a direct relevance to a question that occupies the modern law of business: the responsibility of companies and financial institutions for the effects… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldHuman rights due diligence in Swiss banking today
For Swiss banks and asset managers, the questions raised by the colonial history are part of the modern framework of responsible finance. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldA city that looks at its own sources of wealth
The willingness of Basel institutions to examine the colonial origins of their wealth has grown since the early 2000s. Foundations have commissioned studies of the fortunes on which they rest. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Basel Mission and the Basel Mission Trading Company — conclusion
The Basel Mission, founded in 1815 by Pietist citizens of Basel, became one of the largest Protestant missionary societies of the nineteenth century, with missions in the Gold Coast, southern India,… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldA missionary society in a merchant city
In 1815, the year of the Congress of Vienna and of the final defeat of Napoleon, a group of Pietist citizens of Basel founded a missionary society. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe founders and their world
The Basel Mission was founded by members of the Pietist network that had formed around the German Christentumsgesellschaft, which Chapter II described. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Gold Coast mission
In 1828, the Basel Mission sent its first missionaries to the Gold Coast, the stretch of the West African coast between the Ivory Coast and the Slave Coast, where European powers had maintained forts… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe mission in India
In 1834, the Basel Mission began work on the Malabar coast of southwestern India, in the region of Mangalore, then part of the British Madras Presidency. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldCameroon and China
The Basel Mission extended its work beyond the Gold Coast and India. In 1847, it began work in southern China, in the Hakka-speaking regions of Guangdong province, where it founded churches, schools… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldEducation as investment
The mission schools were the most lasting contribution of the Basel Mission to the societies in which it worked. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe finances of the mission
As a large organisation, the Basel Mission needed careful management of its finances. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe mission presses
The Basel Mission continued, in its mission fields, the printing tradition of its home city. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldChristianity and commerce: the founding of the trading company
The economic activities of the mission raised questions of principle and of management. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe trading company in the Gold Coast
In the Gold Coast, the trading company opened stores in Christiansborg, Accra and other towns, and later in the interior. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe cocoa revolution
The most important economic transformation in which the Basel Mission and its trading company participated was the rise of the cocoa economy in the Gold Coast. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe First World War and the seizure of the company
The First World War brought a crisis for the Basel Mission and its trading company. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldThe Basel Trading Company in the twentieth century
The Basler Handelsgesellschaft continued to operate in West Africa through the twentieth century. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldFrom Christian commerce to impact investment
The idea that commerce could serve a moral purpose, which the Basel Mission Trading Company embodied, has a modern successor in the movement for impact investment and responsible business. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldMission 21 and the archives of the mission
In 2001, the Basel Mission merged with other missionary organisations to form Mission 21, the Protestant mission of Basel, which continues the work of the Basel Mission in partnership with churches… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldBasel, Geneva and Africa
The companion volume on Geneva devotes a part to Geneva as an African business hub, examining the commodity trading companies, the banks, the international organisations and the francophone networks… Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldGhana and Switzerland today: cocoa, gold and responsibility
The economic relationship between Switzerland and Ghana, which the Basel Mission Trading Company inaugurated in the nineteenth century, has taken new forms. Read more Basel · Merchants, the "Daig" and the WorldFrom mission to development cooperation
The Swiss federal development cooperation, organised since 1961 and today conducted by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation and the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, has taken over… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsurancePartition of the Canton, Railways and the New Basel Economy — conclusion
The nineteenth century transformed Basel from a commercial city of ribbon merchants into an industrial and financial centre. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceA city against its countryside
In the summer of 1833, armed men from the city of Basel marched into the countryside to suppress a rebellion of the rural population. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceDividing a state
The separation of the canton required the division of its assets and liabilities, a task that raised legal and financial questions of considerable complexity. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceTwo half-cantons and their institutions
The separation produced two very different polities. Basel-Stadt was a small, urban, wealthy canton, governed until the 1870s by the old families and dominated by commerce, banking and the emerging… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe first railway on Swiss soil
The railway age reached Switzerland through Basel. In the early 1840s, a French company built a railway from Strasbourg along the left bank of the Rhine to Saint-Louis, on the border near Basel. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Swiss Central Railway
The Swiss railway network was built in the 1850s by private companies under concessions granted by the cantons, under the Federal Railway Act of 1852, which left the construction and operation of… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceFinancing the railways
The construction of railways required capital on a scale that Switzerland had never seen. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceAlfred Escher, Zurich and the Gotthard
The railway age also changed the balance between the Swiss financial centres. In Zurich, the politician and entrepreneur Alfred Escher founded the Swiss Northeastern Railway in 1853 and, to finance… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe nationalisation of the railways
The private railway companies did not fulfil the expectations of the Swiss public. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Basel economy in transformation
The railway age transformed the economy of Basel in several ways. It reduced the cost of transport and opened new markets for the city's industries. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceElectricity, water and the municipal enterprises
The industrial city needed new infrastructure: gas for lighting and heating, clean water, sewerage, electricity and public transport. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Rhine port and the return of navigation
As Part A described, the revival of Rhine navigation to Basel at the beginning of the twentieth century was the work of the engineer Rudolf Gelpke and his supporters. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe federal customs and the border economy
The Federal Constitution of 1848 transferred customs to the Confederation. The cantons lost the tolls and duties that they had levied for centuries on goods crossing their borders. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceUrban expansion and the finance of building
The demolition of the city walls, which began in 1859 after a decision of the cantonal parliament, opened the way for the expansion of Basel. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceBasel and the Franco-Prussian War
The Franco-Prussian War of 1870 and 1871 brought war to the gates of Basel and changed the political map of its region. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceBasel as a host of international congresses
The tradition of Basel as a place of international meetings, which Part A traced to the Council of 1431, continued in the industrial age. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe First World War at the border
The First World War placed Basel on the edge of a front line. From the autumn of 1914, the Western Front ran through the Sundgau, a few kilometres from the Swiss border near Basel. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe general strike of 1918 and its aftermath
The end of the First World War brought social unrest to Switzerland. Inflation, food shortages, the influenza pandemic and the hardships of the soldiers on border duty had strained the working… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceConsumers' cooperatives and a cooperative bank
The working class of industrial Basel organised not only in trade unions and political parties but also in cooperatives. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceHousing the industrial city
The rapid growth of the population in the second half of the nineteenth century created a housing crisis. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceA city of migrants at the turn of the century
By 1900, Basel was a city of immigrants. A large share of its population had been born outside the canton, in other Swiss cantons or abroad. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceTelegraph, telephone and the speed of markets
The railway was accompanied by the telegraph, which transformed the transmission of information. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe finances of the half-canton
The separation of 1833 left Basel-Stadt with the wealth of the city but without the rural territory whose rents and taxes had contributed to the old canton's revenues. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceFrom Dyes to Chemistry: Geigy, Ciba, Sandoz and Roche — conclusion
The chemical industry of Basel grew out of the silk dyeing tradition of the city. Its founders, many of them from Lyon and Alsace, began producing synthetic dyes in 1859, attracted by the absence of… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceColours from coal
In 1856, an eighteen-year-old chemistry student in London, William Henry Perkin, tried to synthesise quinine, the antimalarial drug, from substances derived from coal tar. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceWhy Basel?
Several factors explain why the chemical industry developed in Basel. The first was the silk industry. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceAlexander Clavel and the origins of Ciba
The first producer of synthetic dyes in Basel was Alexander Clavel, a silk dyer from Lyon who had settled in Basel and operated a silk dyeing business. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceGeigy: from the dye merchant to the dye maker
The Geigy family had traded in dyestuffs, drugs and chemicals since 1758, as Part C showed. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceSandoz and the other dye makers
In 1886, the chemist Alfred Kern and the businessman Edouard Sandoz founded the firm Kern & Sandoz in Basel to produce synthetic dyes. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe patent question
The absence of patent protection, which had favoured the birth of the Basel chemical industry, became a political issue in the last decades of the nineteenth century. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe war windfall and the Basel cartel
The First World War transformed the position of the Basel chemical industry, as the previous chapter noted. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceFrom dyes to medicines
The transition from dyes to pharmaceuticals followed a scientific logic. Dyes and drugs are both organic compounds, produced by the same chemical techniques. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceRoche: a pharmaceutical company from the beginning
Unlike Ciba, Geigy and Sandoz, which began as dye makers, Roche was a pharmaceutical company from its foundation. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceGeigy and DDT
Geigy remained primarily a dye company until the 1930s, when it diversified into textile auxiliaries, agricultural chemicals and pharmaceuticals. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceGoing abroad: the multinationalisation of Basel chemistry
The Basel chemical companies became multinationals early. The small Swiss market absorbed only a fraction of their production, whereas their customers were textile industries, physicians and farmers… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceFinancing the chemical industry
The Basel chemical companies financed their growth largely from their own profits. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe chemical worker and the research laboratory
The chemical industry created two new figures in the Basel workforce: the chemical worker and the research chemist. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe chemical industry and the Basel economy
By 1945, the chemical industry had become the dominant industry of Basel. It employed tens of thousands of workers in the city and the region, it was the largest taxpayer of the canton and its… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Rhine as a resource and a sewer
The chemical industry of Basel used the Rhine in two ways. It drew large quantities of water from the river for its production processes, for cooling and for washing, before discharging its waste… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceFrom agrochemicals to Syngenta
Alongside dyes and pharmaceuticals, the Basel companies developed agricultural chemicals: insecticides, fungicides, herbicides and seed treatments. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe industry association
The chemical companies of Basel organised their common interests in an industry association, founded in 1882 as the Swiss Society of Chemical Industries, today scienceindustries, the business… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceManaging the franc
The Basel chemical companies earned most of their revenues abroad and incurred a large part of their costs in Switzerland, where their headquarters, research laboratories and many of their production… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceScience, universities and the Basel model
Because the chemical industry of Basel depended on science, it built close relationships with the universities and research institutions of Switzerland. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceBrands, advertising and the pharmaceutical market
Fritz Hoffmann-La Roche understood earlier than most of his competitors that a medicine was also a product that had to be marketed. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe chemical industry and the canton's tax base
By the middle of the twentieth century, the chemical industry had become the largest source of tax revenue for the canton of Basel-Stadt. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Banks: Bankverein, Handelsbank, Kantonalbank — conclusion
In the industrial age, the banks of Basel took new forms. The consortium of private bankers of 1854 became the Basler Bankverein in 1872, a joint-stock bank that merged with the Zürcher Bankverein in… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe age of the joint-stock bank
In the second half of the nineteenth century, the private bank, owned by a family and financed by its partners' capital, was joined by a new type of institution: the joint-stock bank, a company whose… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Basler Bankverein
The consortium of six Basel private banks formed in 1854 to finance railways, which Part C described, was a loose association for particular transactions. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Basler Handelsbank
The second major joint-stock bank of Basel was the Basler Handelsbank, founded in 1862. As its name indicates, it was a commercial bank that specialised in the financing of trade and industry. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Paris affair of 1932
On 26 October 1932, French police searched the Paris offices of the Basler Handelsbank and seized documents, among them lists of French clients who had deposited assets with the bank in Switzerland… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Basler Kantonalbank
The cantonal banks were founded in the second half of the nineteenth century to provide credit to the population and the economy of their cantons on conditions that the private and joint-stock banks… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Swiss National Bank and Basel
The foundation of the Swiss National Bank in 1907, which Part C described, took the issue of banknotes away from the cantonal and commercial banks, among them the Bank in Basel. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceUniversal banking and the Swiss model
The Swiss big banks that emerged in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries followed the model of universal banking, in which a single institution performed all banking functions. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceCapital exports and foreign lending
Switzerland became a major exporter of capital in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe banking crisis of the 1930s
The Great Depression hit the Swiss banks hard. The standstill agreements froze their German assets, the collapse of world trade reduced the business of their industrial clients and the depreciation… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceArticle 47: the criminal protection of banking secrecy
The Banking Act of 1934 contained a provision that would make Switzerland famous and controversial for the rest of the century. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe devaluation of 1936
The Swiss franc remained tied to gold throughout the early 1930s, when Britain, the United States and other countries abandoned the gold standard and devalued their currencies. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceFlight capital in the 1930s
The political and economic crises of the 1930s drove capital to Switzerland. Investors from France, Germany, Italy, Austria, Spain and Eastern Europe, fearing devaluation, confiscation, exchange… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe private banks between the wars
The private banks of Basel, among them La Roche & Co, Dreyfus Söhne & Cie and A. Sarasin & Cie, continued their business alongside the big banks during the industrial age. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceBanks and industry: the Basel system
By the middle of the twentieth century, a close network of relationships connected the banks and the chemical industry of Basel. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceNumbered accounts and the practice of confidentiality
The protection of banking secrecy by the Banking Act of 1934 was accompanied by banking practices that reinforced confidentiality. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceSavings banks, mortgages and the regional banks
Alongside the big banks, the cantonal banks and the private banks, a network of smaller banks served the population of the Basel region: savings banks, regional banks and local banks in the towns and… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Basel exchange in the industrial age
The Basel stock exchange, founded in 1876 as Part C described, grew with the industrial economy of the city. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceA city of banks
By the middle of the twentieth century, Basel had a diverse banking landscape. The Swiss Bank Corporation, one of the three big banks, had its head office in the city. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Swiss Bankers Association: self-regulation from Basel
In 1912, the Swiss banks founded a national association to represent their interests: the Swiss Bankers Association. Its seat was established in Basel, where it has remained to this day. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceForeign exchange and the international business of the Basel banks
The international orientation of Basel made foreign exchange one of the core businesses of its banks. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe architecture of banking
The banks of the industrial age expressed their power and their reliability in buildings. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceClerks, women and the banking workforce
The growth of the joint-stock banks created a new professional class: the bank clerk. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceBasel as an Insurance Centre — conclusion
Basel became an insurance centre in the 1860s, when Basel merchants and bankers founded fire, life and transport insurance companies in the aftermath of the great fire of Glarus of 1861, which had… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe business of risk
Insurance is the business of transforming uncertainty into calculable cost. An insurer collects premiums from many policyholders, each of whom faces a risk of loss, and pays the losses of those who… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceBefore the companies: mutual aid and public fire insurance
Before the foundation of insurance companies in the nineteenth century, the people of Basel protected themselves against risk in other ways. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe fire of Glarus and the birth of Swiss insurance companies
On the night of 10 to 11 May 1861, a fire driven by a strong föhn wind destroyed most of the town of Glarus, the capital of the canton of Glarus, leaving thousands of people homeless. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceWhy Basel?
Several factors explain why Basel became an insurance centre. The first was capital. Insurance companies needed capital to guarantee their obligations. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceFederal supervision of insurance
The growth of the insurance industry raised questions of consumer protection. Insurance is a promise to pay in the future: the policyholder who pays premiums today depends on the insurer's ability to… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceLife insurance and the mathematics of mortality
Life insurance was the branch of insurance in which the mathematical tradition of Basel was most directly relevant. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceLife insurance and the duty of disclosure
The relationship between a life insurer and its policyholders raises legal questions that have occupied the courts and the legislators for more than a century. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceInternational expansion
The Basel insurers looked beyond Switzerland from the beginning. The Swiss market was small. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe German business in the Nazi period
The German business of the Swiss insurers became a moral and political problem after 1933. The Nazi regime imposed its policies on all companies operating in Germany, including foreign ones. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceSocial insurance alongside private insurance
In the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the state took over a growing part of the protection against life's risks. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Basel insurers in the interwar period and the war
The Basel insurers survived the crises of the interwar period, although they suffered losses on their foreign business. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceFrom many companies to one group
The Basel insurance companies founded in the 1860s operated for a long time as separate companies with interlocking ownership and management. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceInsurance and the financial centre
Insurance contributes to a financial centre in several ways. Insurers are among the largest institutional investors, holding large portfolios of bonds, shares, real estate and mortgages to cover… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceInsuring the chemical industry
The chemical industry posed particular challenges for insurers. Its factories handled flammable, explosive and toxic substances, operated high-pressure and high-temperature processes and stored large… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceTransport insurance from a landlocked city
It may seem paradoxical that a landlocked city should become a centre of transport insurance. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceHealth insurance and the sickness funds
Health insurance in Switzerland developed from the mutual aid societies of the guilds and the workers' movement. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceInsurers as investors
Insurance companies are among the largest investors in any financial centre, because they hold large reserves to cover their future obligations to policyholders. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceBasel, Zurich and the geography of Swiss insurance
The Swiss insurance industry is concentrated in a few cities. Zurich is the seat of Swiss Re, the Zurich Insurance Group and Swiss Life. Basel is the seat of the merged Helvetia Baloise group. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceLiability, risk and the law of damages
The growth of industry created new risks for third parties: workers injured in factories, residents harmed by pollution, consumers harmed by defective products, passengers injured in railway… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceLife insurance as popular saving
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, life insurance became a form of saving for the broader population. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe insurer and the state
The relationship between the Basel insurers and the state evolved over the century covered by this part. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceStatistics and the measurement of risk
Insurance depends on statistics. Over time, Basel developed a tradition of statistical measurement that served its insurers. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceCrises, World Wars and the Bank for International Settlements (1930–1945) — conclusion
The Bank for International Settlements was founded in 1930 under the Hague Agreements to handle the reparations of the Young Plan. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceA bank for the reparations
On 17 May 1930, a new institution opened its offices in a former hotel opposite the main railway station of Basel. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe reparations problem
The Treaty of Versailles of 1919 obliged Germany to pay reparations for the damage caused by the war. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Hague Agreements and the Swiss charter
The Young Plan was adopted by the governments at two conferences in The Hague in August 1929 and January 1930. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceWhy Basel?
The choice of Basel as the seat of the BIS was the result of a compromise. Several cities were considered: London, the financial capital of the world, was unacceptable to France; Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe first shareholders and the first president
The capital of the BIS was subscribed by the central banks of the countries that were parties to the Young Plan, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom, and by a Japanese banking… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe crisis of 1931
The BIS had barely begun its work when the world financial crisis of 1931 broke out. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceA bank for central banks
In the 1930s, the BIS developed the functions that would define it for the rest of the century. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe Czech gold
The darkest episode in the history of the BIS before the war concerned the gold of the Czechoslovak National Bank. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe BIS during the Second World War
When the Second World War broke out in September 1939, the BIS was in a delicate position. Its shareholders included the central banks of belligerent states on both sides. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceSwitzerland, gold and the war economy
The conduct of the BIS during the war was part of a broader question about the role of Switzerland and its financial centre in the war. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceRefugees at the border of Basel
Basel, at the border with Germany and occupied France, was one of the places where the Swiss refugee policy of the war years was enacted. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe war at the border of Basel
The war came close to Basel. When the German army conquered France in 1940, Basel was surrounded by German-controlled territory on all sides except the Swiss. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe reckoning of the 1990s
The questions about the conduct of the Swiss financial centre during the war, which had been settled in 1946 by the Washington Agreement, returned in the 1990s. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceBasel in the Great Depression
The Great Depression reached Basel at the beginning of the 1930s. As the collapse of world trade reduced the exports of the chemical and textile industries, unemployment rose. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceClearing, credits and the economic relationship with Germany
During the Second World War, the economic relationship between Switzerland and Germany was governed by clearing agreements. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe BIS and its staff in wartime Basel
The BIS continued to operate in Basel throughout the war with a small staff drawn from many countries, among them Germans, Italians, Britons, Frenchmen, Americans and Swiss. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceLessons for modern central banking
The early history of the BIS contains lessons that remain relevant for modern central banking and international financial institutions. The first lesson is the importance of cooperation in crises. Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceThe BIS after the war
The end of the war did not end the controversy about the BIS. The Bretton Woods resolution recommending its liquidation remained on the table, with the American government pressing for its… Read more Basel · Industrialisation, Banking and InsuranceMemory and responsibility in Basel
The history of the Second World War has left traces in the memory of Basel. The Jewish community of the city, which supported refugees during the war at its own expense, maintains the memory of those… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Basel Banking Landscape — conclusion
The Basel banking landscape today comprises the Basel seat of UBS, the cantonal banks of the two half-cantons, a group of traditional private banks, Bank J. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayA financial centre in the shadow of Zurich
Basel is the second-oldest banking city of Switzerland after Geneva and the seat of the oldest international financial institution in the world, although Zurich and Geneva both exceed it in size as… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayUBS: the Basel root of the largest Swiss bank
In December 1997, the Swiss Bank Corporation of Basel and the Union Bank of Switzerland of Zurich announced their merger. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe collapse of Credit Suisse
Credit Suisse was founded in Zurich in 1856 by Alfred Escher as the Schweizerische Kreditanstalt, as Part D described. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe cantonal banks of Basel
The Basler Kantonalbank and the Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank, founded in 1899 and 1864, remain the principal banks of the domestic economy of the two half-cantons. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe private banks
Basel has a group of private banks of long standing. La Roche & Co Banquiers, founded in 1787, is one of the oldest private banks in Switzerland and still bears the name of the family that founded… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayAsset managers, trustees and family offices
Alongside the banks, the Basel financial centre includes a large number of independent asset managers, trust companies and family offices. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayForeign banks and the international presence
Basel hosts relatively few foreign banks compared with Zurich and Geneva. Most foreign banks that want to serve Swiss clients or to manage the wealth of international clients in Switzerland establish… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe pharmaceutical treasuries as financial actors
A distinctive feature of the Basel financial centre is the presence of the treasury departments of Roche and Novartis. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayPension funds and institutional investors
The pension funds of the Basel region, among them the pension funds of Roche, Novartis and the canton of Basel-Stadt, are among the largest institutional investors in the region. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe too-big-to-fail debate after 2023
The takeover of Credit Suisse by UBS created a bank whose balance sheet is roughly twice the gross domestic product of Switzerland and whose failure would exceed the capacity of the Swiss state to… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayBasel as a centre of banking policy
Basel's importance for the financial centre derives above all from the institutions that shape banking policy. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe cum-ex affair and the limits of custody
The cum-ex affair, which shook the German financial system in the 2010s, reached Basel through the involvement of Swiss banks and investors. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Basler Kantonalbank and the Bank Cler group
The Basler Kantonalbank was established by the canton of Basel-Stadt in 1899 to provide the urban population and local trade with savings facilities, mortgages and commercial credit on sound terms. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank and the regional banks
The Basellandschaftliche Kantonalbank, founded in 1864 with its head office in Liestal, is older than its counterpart in the city. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Swiss Bankers Association, a Basel foundation
The Swiss Bankers Association was founded in Basel in 1912 as the Schweizerische Bankiervereinigung. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Basel stock exchange and its absorption into SIX
Basel had its own stock exchange for more than a century. Organised trading in securities developed in the city in the nineteenth century, and a formal exchange under cantonal regulation was… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayEmployment, value added and the insurance link
The weight of the financial sector in the economy of Basel-Stadt is smaller than in Zurich or Geneva. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayCross-border clients and the trinational workforce
The labour market of Basel extends into Germany and France. Tens of thousands of cross-border commuters from southern Baden and the Haut-Rhin work in the two Basel half-cantons, many of them in the… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayFinancing the life sciences and the digital bank
The life sciences cluster of the Basel region is among the most important in the world. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodaySupervision: FINMA, the Banking Act, FinSA and FinIA — conclusion
The Swiss financial market is supervised by FINMA, an integrated authority created in 2009, which relies on audit firms for a large part of its supervision and, for portfolio managers and trustees,… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayAn integrated supervisor
Since 1 January 2009, the Swiss financial market has been supervised by a single authority, the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority, FINMA. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Swiss model of dual supervision
FINMA relies to a large extent on the audit firms that the supervised institutions appoint. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe licence and its conditions
The Banking Act requires every institution that accepts deposits from the public on a professional basis, or that refinances itself with several banks to finance an unlimited number of persons, to… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayCapital: the implementation of Basel III
The capital requirements for Swiss banks are set out in the Capital Adequacy Ordinance, which implements the standards of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayLiquidity and the lessons of 2023
The liquidity of banks, their capacity to meet their obligations when depositors withdraw their funds, is regulated by the Liquidity Ordinance. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayToo big to fail
The financial crisis of 2008 and the rescue of UBS led Switzerland to adopt a special regime for systemically important banks, known as the too-big-to-fail regime, which entered into force in 2012. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Swiss finish
Switzerland has often implemented international standards with requirements that go beyond the international minimum, a practice known as the Swiss finish. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayFinSA and FinIA: a new architecture
On 1 January 2020, two new laws entered into force that transformed the regulation of financial services and financial institutions in Switzerland: the Financial Services Act, FinSA, and the… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayClient segmentation and the duties of conduct
The Financial Services Act distinguishes between three categories of clients: retail clients, professional clients and institutional clients. Retail clients receive the highest level of protection. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayProspectuses, key information documents and the author's theme
The Financial Services Act introduced a uniform prospectus regime for public offerings of securities and for the admission of securities to trading. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayOmbudsman, dispute resolution and the client adviser register
The Financial Services Act requires financial service providers to join an ombudsman office recognised by the Federal Department of Finance, unless they serve only institutional and professional… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayCrypto-assets and digital assets
Switzerland has been one of the first jurisdictions to develop a legal framework for crypto-assets and digital assets. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayCross-border services and market access
The Swiss regulation of cross-border financial services is liberal in one direction and constrained in the other. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayFINMA's enforcement toolkit and the debate on fines
FINMA separates its ongoing supervision from enforcement. Supervision consists of the regular dialogue with the institutions, the review of their reports, the on-site reviews and the work of the… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe guarantee of irreproachable conduct in practice
The guarantee of irreproachable business conduct appears in the Banking Act and, in similar terms, in the Financial Institutions Act, the Insurance Supervision Act and the Financial Market… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayDeposit protection and the reform of esisuisse
Switzerland protects bank deposits through a system that combines a statutory privilege in bankruptcy with the self-regulation of the banks. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe reform agenda after Credit Suisse
The previous chapter described the debate on the capital requirements for UBS that followed the takeover of Credit Suisse. From the perspective of supervision, the reform agenda reaches further. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Swiss National Bank and financial stability
The National Bank Act entrusts the Swiss National Bank with the task of contributing to the stability of the financial system. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayInnovation, outsourcing and operational resilience
Switzerland has tried to adapt its banking regulation to new business models. Since 2017, the Banking Ordinance has allowed companies to accept public deposits of up to one million francs without a… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodaySelf-regulation and sustainable finance
The Swiss Bankers Association in Basel, whose history Part D described, has developed self-regulatory rules in many areas of banking. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayFINMA and foreign supervisors
A financial centre whose institutions operate worldwide depends on cooperation between supervisors. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayAnti-Money Laundering: AMLA, CDB and Beneficial Ownership — conclusion
The Swiss anti-money laundering regime was built in response to scandals. The Chiasso affair of 1977 led to the first agreement on due diligence of the banks. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayFrom discretion to due diligence
For most of the twentieth century, the Swiss financial centre regarded the origin of its clients' assets as their private affair. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe scandals that made the rules
The Swiss anti-money laundering regime was built in response to a series of scandals. The first was the Chiasso affair of 1977. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe criminal offence of money laundering
Article 305bis of the Swiss Criminal Code has been in force since 1 August 1990. It punishes anyone who carries out an act that is capable of frustrating the identification of the origin, the tracing… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Anti-Money Laundering Act of 1997
The Anti-Money Laundering Act, adopted in 1997 and in force since 1 April 1998, established the administrative law framework for the prevention of money laundering. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodaySelf-regulation and supervision
The Swiss anti-money laundering regime combines state supervision with self-regulation. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayBeneficial ownership
The identification of the beneficial owner is the core of modern anti-money laundering regulation. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayTax offences as predicate offences
The most significant change to the Swiss anti-money laundering regime in the 2010s was the inclusion of serious tax offences among the predicate offences of money laundering. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayPolitically exposed persons and illicit assets
Politically exposed persons, persons who hold or have held prominent public functions, and their family members and close associates are exposed to particular risks of corruption. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayMutual legal assistance and the cooperation of authorities
The fight against money laundering requires cooperation across borders. Because assets of criminal origin are often transferred through several countries, tracing them requires information from banks… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodaySanctions
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, sanctions have become one of the central concerns of the Swiss financial centre. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Financial Action Task Force and Switzerland
The Financial Action Task Force, an intergovernmental body founded by the G7 in 1989 with its secretariat at the OECD in Paris, sets the international standards for the fight against money laundering… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe practitioner's view
The Swiss anti-money laundering regime is today one of the most demanding in the world. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Basel Institute on Governance
Few cities can claim an institution devoted entirely to the study and prevention of corruption and financial crime. Basel can. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayAsset recovery in practice
The Swiss policy of asset recovery, which the section on politically exposed persons introduced, developed through a series of cases that tested the limits of the law. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Wolfsberg Group and private-sector standards
Alongside the law and the self-regulation of national associations, the global banks have developed their own standards. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayDealers, real estate and the art market
The anti-money laundering regime was originally designed for financial intermediaries. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayAdvisers, lawyers and professional secrecy
The most controversial element of the recent reform package was the extension of due diligence duties to advisers. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayCrypto-assets and digital assets
Crypto-assets and digital assets present the anti-money laundering regime with a new kind of challenge. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayDe-risking and the burden on clients
The demanding Swiss regime has a side that is rarely discussed in legislation but felt daily by clients: the decision of banks to avoid risks by avoiding clients. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe End of Banking Secrecy for Foreign Clients — conclusion
For seventy-five years after 1934, banking secrecy and the Swiss distinction between tax evasion and tax fraud protected foreign clients who held undeclared assets in Swiss banks. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayA pillar that seemed permanent
For seventy-five years after the Banking Act of 1934, banking secrecy was regarded in Switzerland as a pillar of the financial centre and of the national identity. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayEvasion and fraud: the Swiss distinction
The core of the Swiss position was a legal distinction. Swiss tax law distinguishes between tax evasion, the failure to declare income or assets, and tax fraud, the use of forged, falsified or false… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe European Savings Tax Agreement
The first breach in the system came from the European Union. In 2003, the European Union adopted the Savings Taxation Directive, which provided for the automatic exchange of information on interest… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe UBS case
The decisive blow came from the United States. In 2007, Bradley Birkenfeld, an American private banker who had worked for UBS in Geneva, approached the American authorities and revealed that UBS had… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe OECD standard and the grey list
The UBS case coincided with a global offensive against tax havens. In the wake of the financial crisis, the G20, meeting in London in April 2009, declared that the era of banking secrecy was over and… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayData theft and the purchase of stolen data
The collapse of banking secrecy was accelerated by the theft of client data. In 2008, the German tax authorities purchased from a former employee of the Liechtenstein bank LGT a set of data on German… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Rubik agreements
Switzerland tried to save banking secrecy for existing relationships by proposing an alternative to the exchange of information: final withholding tax agreements, known as Rubik agreements. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe United States Program for Swiss Banks
The UBS case was followed by investigations of other Swiss banks by the American Department of Justice. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayFATCA
In parallel with the investigations, the United States adopted a law that would make the exchange of information automatic. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe automatic exchange of information
FATCA inspired a global standard. In 2014, the OECD adopted the Common Reporting Standard for the automatic exchange of financial account information, under which financial institutions identify the… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayWhat remains of banking secrecy
Banking secrecy has not disappeared entirely. Article 47 of the Banking Act still makes the disclosure of client information by bank employees a criminal offence. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayConsequences for private banking
The end of banking secrecy for foreign clients transformed Swiss private banking. Clients with undeclared assets had to regularise them through voluntary disclosure programmes in their home… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe origins of banking secrecy and the founding myth
The confidentiality of the banker towards his client is older than the Banking Act. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe white money strategy and the Swiss Bankers Association
Once the decision of 13 March 2009 had been taken, the Federal Council needed a strategy for a financial centre whose business with undeclared foreign assets had lost its legal protection. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayVoluntary disclosure in the neighbouring countries
The end of banking secrecy created a demand that the tax laws of the neighbouring countries had to meet. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Swiss domestic amnesties of 2010
Switzerland also reformed its own law. With effect from 1 January 2010, the Federal Act on the Simplification of Subsequent Taxation in Cases of Succession and on the Introduction of Penalty-Free… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe transfer of employee data to the United States
The American investigations raised a problem that went beyond the protection of clients. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayAdministrative assistance after 2009
The adoption of the OECD standard required a new procedural framework. After first applying an ordinance, Switzerland adopted the Federal Act on International Administrative Assistance in Tax… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayLeaks and the end of opaque structures
After 2009, the end of banking secrecy for accounts in a client's own name did not immediately end the use of more complex structures. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayRegularisation from the client's perspective
For the individual client, the end of banking secrecy was experienced as a sequence of letters. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayWealth Planning, Trusts and Foundations from Basel — conclusion
Wealth planning has become the core of the value proposition of the Basel private banks since the end of banking secrecy for foreign clients. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayFrom safekeeping to planning
When banking secrecy ended for foreign clients, the Swiss private banks had to find a new justification for their fees. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe Swiss foundation
The foundation is the oldest instrument of Swiss wealth planning. Under Article 80 of the Civil Code, a foundation is created by the dedication of assets to a particular purpose. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayTrusts and the Hague Convention
Switzerland is a civil-law country without a domestic law of trusts. Swiss banks, trust companies and lawyers have nonetheless administered trusts for decades, because their international clients… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe debate on a Swiss trust
For the last decade Switzerland has debated whether to introduce a trust into its own law. The motion of Parliament in 2018 instructed the Federal Council to create the legal basis for a Swiss trust. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayTaxation of wealthy individuals
The taxation of wealthy individuals is shaped by the federal structure of Switzerland. The Confederation levies a direct income tax, but no federal wealth tax and no federal inheritance tax. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe JUSO initiative and the future of inheritance taxation
In 2024, the youth wing of the Social Democratic Party submitted a popular initiative for a federal inheritance and gift tax of fifty per cent on estates and gifts above fifty million francs, with… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayLife insurance as a planning tool
Life insurance has long been a planning instrument for wealthy families in continental Europe. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayPhilanthropy
Philanthropy is a central part of wealth planning in Basel, as the earlier description of the city's foundations suggests. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe reform of Swiss succession law
Swiss succession law has been modernised in two stages. The first stage, which entered into force on 1 January 2023, reduced the compulsory shares of descendants and abolished the compulsory share of… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe European Succession Regulation
The European Succession Regulation, applicable since 17 August 2015 in all member states of the European Union except Denmark and Ireland, determines the law applicable to succession and the… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayMatrimonial property and the family
Wealth planning does not stop at the law of succession. Matrimonial property law determines how the assets of spouses are divided on divorce or death, and in an international family several… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayFamily governance
The largest risk to a family fortune is often the family itself. Studies of family businesses and family wealth suggest that many fortunes do not survive the third generation, usually because of… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayFamily offices in Basel
A family office is an organisation that manages the affairs of one family or of several families. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayThe advisers
Wealth planning in Basel is practised by a network of professions: private bankers and their wealth planning departments, independent asset managers, trustees, lawyers, notaries, tax advisers and… Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayCompliance in wealth planning
The end of banking secrecy changed wealth planning as profoundly as it changed private banking. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayArt and collections in wealth planning
For many wealthy families in Basel, the most personal part of the estate hangs on the walls. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayCrypto-assets and digital assets in succession planning
Crypto-assets and digital assets have become a regular part of the estates that wealth planners in Switzerland handle, and the author advises on them as one of the fields of his practice. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayPension planning for wealthy individuals
Of the three pillars on which the Swiss pension system rests, the second and third offer planning options that wealthy residents of Basel use regularly. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayReal estate in the canton
Real estate, which is part of almost every large estate, is subject in Basel to two layers of rules that foreign families should understand before they buy. The first is federal. Read more Basel · Private Banking and the Regulatory Framework TodayMoving to Basel as a wealthy family
Families who consider moving to Basel often begin with practical questions and only later reach the legal ones. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Bank for International Settlements: Foundation, Status and Governance — conclusion
The Bank for International Settlements has travelled a long way from the reparations bank of 1930. Read more Basel · International BaselThe oldest international financial institution
The Bank for International Settlements is the oldest international financial institution in the world. Read more Basel · International BaselThe founding charter in brief
Since Part D has described in detail how the BIS came into being, a short summary suffices here. Read more Basel · International BaselFrom reparations bank to central bankers' club
The reparations, the original raison d'être of the BIS, collapsed with the Hoover Moratorium of June 1931 and were effectively ended by the Lausanne Conference of 1932. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Basel arrangements of the 1960s
The defence of the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates gave the governors' meetings in Basel their first great test. Read more Basel · International BaselThe new agenda of the 1970s
In 1971 the governors of the Group of Ten established the Euro-currency Standing Committee, which monitored the offshore markets in dollar deposits that had grown in London and other centres beyond… Read more Basel · International BaselEurope in Basel
For thirty years Basel was also a centre of European monetary integration. In 1964 the member states of the European Economic Community created the Committee of Governors of the Central Banks of the… Read more Basel · International BaselThe Headquarters Agreement of 1987
The Constituent Charter of 1930 regulated the status of the BIS under Swiss law in a fragmentary manner. Read more Basel · International BaselAn international organisation in the form of a company
The legal nature of the BIS has puzzled lawyers since 1930. The bank was incorporated as a company limited by shares under a special Swiss charter. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Statutes and the shareholders
The constitution of the BIS is laid down in its Statutes, which were annexed to the Constituent Charter of 1930 and have been amended many times since. Read more Basel · International BaselThe withdrawal of the private shareholders
When the BIS was founded in 1930, not all the shares ended up in the hands of central banks. The American shares were subscribed by a group of commercial banks led by J. P. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Hague arbitration
Several former private shareholders challenged the repurchase. Some of them, among them the investment fund First Eagle and individual shareholders, brought proceedings before the Commercial Court of… Read more Basel · International BaselGeneral Meeting, Board and Management
The governance of the BIS follows the pattern of a company limited by shares adapted to its public character. Read more Basel · International BaselThe General Managers
The list of General Managers reflects the evolution of the bank. The first General Manager, the Frenchman Pierre Quesnay, served from 1930 until his death in 1937, and was succeeded by Roger Auboin,… Read more Basel · International BaselA bank for central banks
The banking business of the BIS attracts little public attention, although it remains the source of its income and of its independence. Read more Basel · International BaselResearch, statistics and the Monetary and Economic Department
The Monetary and Economic Department is the intellectual centre of the BIS. Its economists analyse monetary policy, financial markets, banking and the international monetary system. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Representative Offices in Hong Kong and Mexico City
As its membership widened, the BIS opened offices outside Basel. The Representative Office for Asia and the Pacific opened in Hong Kong in July 1998, at the height of the Asian financial crisis,… Read more Basel · International BaselThe Tower at the Centralbahnplatz
For almost half a century the BIS worked in the converted hotel at the Centralbahnplatz opposite the railway station. In the 1970s the bank built its own headquarters on a nearby site. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Basel Process
The term "Basel Process" describes the way in which the BIS hosts and supports international groups that pursue financial and monetary stability. Read more Basel · International BaselThe BIS, the city and the Confederation
The relationship between the BIS and its host city has been close but discreet. The bank has contributed to the international character of Basel and has attracted a stream of high-ranking visitors to… Read more Basel · International BaselCriticism: accountability and transparency
The BIS has always attracted criticism. Its role during the Second World War, examined in Part D, has given rise to a literature that questions its neutrality and its relationship with the… Read more Basel · International BaselThe Basel Committee and the Basel Accords — conclusion
The Basel Committee began in 1974 as a modest forum for the exchange of information among supervisors who had seen how the failure of a Cologne bank could disrupt payments in New York. Read more Basel · International BaselA committee without a treaty
Few institutions have shaped the daily work of banks across the world as deeply as the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, although it possesses neither a founding treaty nor legal personality… Read more Basel · International BaselHerstatt, Franklin National and the founding of the Committee
The immediate trigger for the Committee's founding was a series of bank failures in 1974 that exposed the gaps in the supervision of internationally active banks. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Concordat of 1975 and its revision after Banco Ambrosiano
The first substantive product of the Committee was a short paper approved by the G10 governors in December 1975, which became known as the Concordat. Read more Basel · International BaselFrom the Cooke Committee to the Capital Accord of 1988
The work on capital adequacy grew out of a different set of concerns. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, the capital ratios of large international banks declined steadily while their lending to… Read more Basel · International BaselThe market risk amendment and internal models
The Accord of 1988 addressed credit risk alone. As the trading activities of large banks expanded rapidly during the early 1990s, the losses that could arise from movements in interest rates,… Read more Basel · International BaselThe Core Principles for Effective Banking Supervision
The financial crises in Mexico in 1994 and 1995 and in Asia in 1997 drew attention to the weakness of banking supervision in emerging markets. Read more Basel · International BaselBasel II: three pillars and the turn to internal ratings
By the late 1990s, the crudeness of the 1988 risk weights had become a source of distortion. Read more Basel · International BaselCritiques of Basel II and the problem of procyclicality
Criticised from the outset, Basel II attracted a critique that grew in intensity as the framework neared implementation. The first objection concerned complexity. Read more Basel · International BaselThe crisis of 2007–2009 and Basel 2.5
The global financial crisis that began in the summer of 2007 with the turmoil in the US subprime mortgage market and reached its peak after the failure of Lehman Brothers in September 2008 was, among… Read more Basel · International BaselBasel III: capital quality, buffers and the leverage ratio
The core of the post-crisis reforms was published in December 2010 under the title "Basel III: A global regulatory framework for more resilient banks and banking systems", with a revised version in… Read more Basel · International BaselLiquidity standards: LCR and NSFR
Before the crisis, liquidity regulation had been left almost entirely to national authorities, with the Committee publishing only guidance on sound practices. Read more Basel · International BaselSystemically important banks
The crisis demonstrated that the failure of a large, complex and interconnected bank could threaten the entire financial system and that governments therefore felt compelled to rescue such banks. Read more Basel · International BaselThe finalisation of 2017 and the output floor
After the core of Basel III had been agreed, the Committee turned to the calculation of risk-weighted assets. Read more Basel · International BaselImplementation divergences: the EU, the UK and the US
The agreement of December 2017 required transposition into the law of each member jurisdiction. It is in this phase that the consensus of Basel has proved fragile. Read more Basel · International BaselMonitoring consistency: the RCAP
As its standards became more detailed, the Committee recognised that their value depended on consistent implementation. Read more Basel · International BaselMembership, Charter and the legal nature of the standards
For most of its existence, the Committee was a club of the G10 countries plus Switzerland, Luxembourg and later Spain. Read more Basel · International BaselLegitimacy debates and academic critiques
The legal informality of the Committee has prompted a long debate about its legitimacy. Read more Basel · International BaselNew frontiers: crypto-assets and digital assets and climate-related financial risks
Since 2019, the Committee has extended its work to risks that did not exist or were not recognised when the earlier accords were drafted. Read more Basel · International BaselChairs, secretariat and the Basel location
The Committee's chairs have come from the central banks and supervisory authorities of member countries. Read more Basel · International BaselSwiss Implementation of Basel III and the Post-Credit Suisse Debate — overview and summary
The previous chapter followed the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision from its foundation in 1974 to the completion of Basel III in December 2017. Read more Basel · International BaselA standard without force of law
The Basel Committee has no legal personality, no treaty basis and no power to bind its members. Read more Basel · International BaselSwitzerland at the table in Basel
Switzerland was present when the Basel Committee was created. At the end of 1974, after the failure of the Herstatt bank in Cologne and the Franklin National Bank in New York, the central bank… Read more Basel · International BaselThe chain of delegation: from the Banking Act to FINMA's ordinances
How does a Basel standard enter Swiss law? The answer lies in a chain of delegation that runs from the Federal Assembly through the Federal Council to FINMA. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Expert Commission of 2010 and the progressive component
The most consequential Swiss departure from Basel was designed by a commission of experts appointed by the Federal Council in November 2009. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Swiss contingent convertible
The proposals of the Expert Commission gave a central role to an instrument that hardly existed in 2010: debt that converts into equity or is written down when the issuing bank's capital falls below… Read more Basel · International BaselConsistency under review: the RCAP and the IMF
Because the Basel Committee cannot enforce its standards, it relies on peer review. Read more Basel · International BaselProportionality from below: the small banks regime
The Basel standards were written for internationally active banks. Many jurisdictions apply them to all their banks, however, including small savings banks and cooperative banks with purely domestic… Read more Basel · International BaselFinal Basel III, the output floor and the Swiss mortgage
The final Basel III package of December 2017 was the international response to a problem that the Swiss authorities had addressed with the leverage ratio: the variability of risk weights calculated… Read more Basel · International Basel19 March 2023: the AT1 write-down
The weekend of 18 and 19 March 2023 put the Swiss translation of Basel III to its hardest test. Read more Basel · International BaselHierarchy of claims: the reaction abroad
The reaction in other jurisdictions came within a day. On 20 March 2023, the Single Resolution Board, the European Banking Authority and ECB Banking Supervision published a joint statement on the… Read more Basel · International BaselThe litigation
The write-down provoked one of the largest bodies of litigation in Swiss legal history. Read more Basel · International BaselGoing concern, gone concern and the parent bank
The Credit Suisse case has drawn attention to a distinction that is central to the post-2008 architecture: the distinction between going-concern capital, which absorbs losses while the bank continues… Read more Basel · International BaselDid Basel III fail? The international post-mortems
The Basel Committee and the Financial Stability Board both published reports on the banking turmoil of 2023 in October of that year. Read more Basel · International BaselThe political economy of the UBS debate
The proposals of the Federal Council to require full capital backing of foreign participations at the parent level turned a technical question into a matter of national politics. Read more Basel · International BaselLessons for other jurisdictions
The Swiss experience offers several lessons for jurisdictions that implement the Basel standards. The first concerns the form of transposition. Read more Basel · International BaselFSB, IAIS, CPMI and the BIS Innovation Hub — conclusion
The Basel Process has turned the city into the centre of a network of committees and associations that shape the regulation of banks, insurers, deposit insurers, payment systems and financial market… Read more Basel · International BaselThe Basel Process
The Bank for International Settlements is often described as the bank of central banks. Read more Basel · International BaselFrom the Financial Stability Forum to the Financial Stability Board
The Financial Stability Board grew out of the Asian financial crisis of 1997 and 1998. Read more Basel · International BaselThe FSB as a Swiss association
For its first years, the FSB had no legal personality. It was a forum of authorities whose secretariat was employed by the BIS and housed in its building. Read more Basel · International BaselChairs, Plenary and working methods
The chairs of the FSB have been drawn from the senior ranks of central banking. Mario Draghi, who had chaired the FSF since 2006, became the first chair of the FSB in 2009 and remained in office… Read more Basel · International BaselResolution and the Key Attributes
The most important contribution of the FSB to international financial regulation is its framework for the resolution of failing financial institutions. Read more Basel · International BaselG-SIBs, peer reviews and non-bank financial intermediation
Since November 2011, the FSB has published an annual list of global systemically important banks (G-SIBs). Read more Basel · International BaselThe FSB and crypto-assets and digital assets
The FSB turned its attention to crypto-assets and digital assets in 2018, when the rapid growth of the markets for bitcoin and other tokens raised the question of whether they posed risks to… Read more Basel · International BaselThe International Association of Insurance Supervisors
Insurance supervisors organised themselves internationally later than banking supervisors. Read more Basel · International BaselIADI and the protection of depositors
The International Association of Deposit Insurers (IADI) was established in May 2002 as an association under Swiss law, with its secretariat at the BIS in Basel. Read more Basel · International BaselThe CPMI and financial market infrastructure
The Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures has a longer history than its present name suggests. Read more Basel · International BaselMarkets Committee, CGFS and Irving Fisher Committee
Three further central bank committees complete the picture of the Basel Process. The Markets Committee is the oldest of them. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Financial Stability Institute and central bank governance
The Financial Stability Institute (FSI) was set up by the BIS and the Basel Committee at the end of the 1990s, with the task of assisting financial sector supervisors around the world in improving… Read more Basel · International BaselThe BIS Innovation Hub
The BIS Innovation Hub is the most recent addition to the Basel Process. It was established in 2019 with the mandate to identify and develop in-depth insights into critical trends in technology… Read more Basel · International BaselBasel, Washington and Madrid
The Basel bodies do not work in isolation. Their relationship with the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in Washington is one of division of labour. Read more Basel · International BaselLegitimacy and accountability of transgovernmental networks
The bodies described in this chapter have been analysed in legal and political science as transgovernmental networks. Read more Basel · International BaselBasel as a Brand of Global Governance: Institute on Governance, Basel Convention — conclusion
"Basel" has become a name for international regimes through a long accumulation of history and institutions. Read more Basel · International BaselA city name as an institutional label
Most cities are known abroad for their monuments, their football clubs or their products. Basel is known in a stranger way. Read more Basel · International BaselWhy Basel became a name for international regimes
Several factors explain why the name of a medium-sized Swiss city attached itself to international regimes. The first is geography. Read more Basel · International BaselEarlier Basel names in world history
The use of the city's name for events of international significance did not begin with the BIS. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Basel Convention: origins
The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal is today the most widely ratified environmental treaty bearing the city's name. Read more Basel · International BaselStructure and obligations of the Convention
The Convention rests on a few core principles. Transboundary movements of hazardous wastes and other wastes shall be reduced to the minimum consistent with their environmentally sound management. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Ban Amendment and the plastic waste amendments
From its beginning the Convention was criticised by African states and environmental organisations for regulating the waste trade instead of prohibiting it. Read more Basel · International BaselThe BRS conventions
The Basel Convention does not stand alone. Two further treaties deal with hazardous chemicals. Read more Basel · International BaselHazardous waste, environmental crime and finance
At first sight the Basel Convention has little to do with a financial centre. A closer look shows several connections. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Basel Institute on Governance as a governance brand
Part E, Chapter III introduced the Basel Institute on Governance from the perspective of anti-money laundering law. Read more Basel · International BaselPublic governance
The public governance work of the Institute addresses the conditions under which corruption arises in the state. Read more Basel · International BaselCollective action and the private sector
A distinctive contribution of the Institute concerns collective action against corruption. The idea is simple to state. Read more Basel · International BaselGreen corruption
In recent years the Institute has added a programme on what it calls green corruption. Read more Basel · International BaselAcademic programmes and training
The Institute has also made a mark in education. It offers training for prosecutors, investigators and analysts, often in partner countries, and has developed courses on asset recovery, financial… Read more Basel · International BaselSwisspeace and the University of Basel
A second Basel institution in the field of global governance is swisspeace, the Swiss Peace Foundation. Read more Basel · International BaselSwitzerland as host state and the policy of the canton
The international organisations in Basel exist on the basis of agreements with the Swiss Confederation. Read more Basel · International BaselThe Basel Committee as a brand
Among all Basel brands, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision is the most powerful. Its accords have given the city's name a permanent place in the vocabulary of finance. Read more Basel · International BaselConferences, fairs and soft power
A brand of global governance depends on more than standards. It also needs places where people meet. Basel's role as a meeting place goes back to the Council and the fairs of the fifteenth century. Read more Basel · International BaselThe risks of the brand
A brand built on standards carries particular risks. Its value depends on the credibility of the standards, and that credibility can be damaged by failures that have nothing to do with the city… Read more Basel · International BaselThe practitioner's view
For a lawyer who advises banks, asset managers, fiduciaries and private clients across borders, the Basel brand is a matter of daily work. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarRoche, Novartis, Syngenta, Lonza: the Industrial Base — conclusion
The industrial base of the Basel life sciences consists of two global pharmaceutical groups, Roche and Novartis, an agricultural science group in Chinese state ownership, Syngenta, a contract… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarFrom chemical companies to life sciences groups
At the end of the Second World War, the Basel chemical industry consisted of four large companies, Ciba, Geigy, Sandoz and Hoffmann-La Roche, each of which produced dyes, chemicals, pharmaceuticals… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe merger of 1996 and the birth of Novartis
On 7 March 1996, Ciba-Geigy and Sandoz announced their intention to merge into a new company called Novartis, a name derived from the Latin novae artes, new skills. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe logic of spin-offs: Clariant, Ciba Specialty Chemicals, Syngenta, Alcon, Sandoz
The history of the Basel industry since the 1990s is a history of spin-offs. A spin-off, or demerger, separates a business from its parent company and distributes the shares of the new company to the… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe Novartis Campus
The physical expression of the Novartis transformation is the Novartis Campus in the St. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarRoche: family control and a biotechnology bet
Roche differs from Novartis in its ownership structure and in its strategy. While Novartis is a widely held company without a controlling shareholder, Roche is controlled by the descendants of its… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe Roche Towers
If the Novartis Campus is the horizontal expression of pharmaceutical wealth in Basel, the Roche Towers are its vertical expression. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSyngenta: a Basel company in Chinese ownership
Syngenta, created in 2000, developed into the world's largest producer of crop protection chemicals and one of the largest seed companies. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarLonza: from Visp to the contract manufacturing model
Lonza has a different origin from the other Basel groups. It was founded in 1897 in Gampel in the Valais as an electricity company, named after the Lonza river, whose water powered its hydroelectric… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe second tier: Bachem, Idorsia, Basilea, Straumann and the chemical successors
Below the large groups, the Basel region hosts a number of listed life sciences companies of medium size. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe weight of the industry in exports and output
The pharmaceutical industry is the largest exporting sector of Switzerland. According to the foreign trade statistics of the Federal Office for Customs and Border Security, the chemical and… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarEmployment and the regional labour market
The life sciences employ tens of thousands of people in the two Basel cantons, with further employment at sites in Aargau, Valais and the neighbouring regions of Germany and France. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarWeight in the capital market
Roche and Novartis are, together with Nestlé, the three largest companies of the Swiss stock market. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarResearch institutions: University, Biozentrum, Friedrich Miescher Institute, ETH
The life sciences cluster of Basel rests on a dense network of public and private research institutions. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe cluster organisations
The promotion of the life sciences cluster is a task of the cantonal economic policy. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSchweizerhalle, 1 November 1986
The night of 1 November 1986 marks the most serious environmental disaster in the history of the Basel chemical industry. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe regulatory consequences of Schweizerhalle
Schweizerhalle transformed the regulation of chemical risks in Switzerland. The Federal Act on the Protection of the Environment of 1983 had already provided a legal basis for measures against major… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarLiability and insurance after Schweizerhalle
Schweizerhalle also changed the law of liability. At the time of the fire, the liability of the holder of an industrial installation for environmental damage was governed by the general rules of the… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe risk of dependence
The concentration of the canton's economy on a small number of life sciences groups creates a risk of dependence that the political authorities of Basel-Stadt openly acknowledge. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCorporate Finance of the Pharmaceutical Groups — overview and summary
The previous chapter described Roche, Novartis, Syngenta and Lonza as industrial enterprises, with their research centres, production sites and product portfolios. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe financial profile of a Basel pharmaceutical group
The financial profile of a large research-based pharmaceutical company differs markedly from that of a bank or an industrial manufacturer. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCredit ratings and conservative leverage
Roche and Novartis have long belonged to the small group of European industrial companies with credit ratings in the double-A range. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarFinancing Genentech: the bond issues of 2009
The most instructive episode in the financial history of the Basel pharmaceutical groups is the acquisition of the minority shareholding in Genentech by Roche in 2009. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarBond programmes and the issuing vehicles
Both groups finance themselves through several issuing entities whose location follows the market concerned. Roche has used Roche Holdings, Inc. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarRoche's capital: bearer shares and non-voting equity securities
The equity capital of Roche Holding AG has a structure that is unusual among large listed companies. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe family pool and voting control
The bearer shares of Roche are controlled to a large extent by the descendants of the founder Fritz Hoffmann-La Roche and of the Oeri family, who have bound their holdings in a shareholder pool. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarNovartis: registered shares and the American listing
Novartis has a conventional capital structure with a single class of registered shares, each with one vote. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe weight of pharmaceuticals in the Swiss indices
The size of Roche and Novartis has consequences that reach far beyond Basel. Together with Nestlé, the two companies have for many years accounted for a large part of the market capitalisation of the… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarDividends as a tradition
Dividends are a core element of the financial identity of both groups. Roche has increased its dividend in Swiss francs every year for several decades, according to its own investor information for… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarShare buy-backs, the second trading line and withholding tax
In addition to dividends, both groups return capital to shareholders through share buy-backs. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe Novartis stake in Roche and its unwinding
The most remarkable episode in the relationship between the two Basel groups is the stake that Novartis held in Roche for twenty years. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarAcquisitions at Novartis
Mergers and acquisitions are the area in which the corporate finance of the Basel groups becomes most visible to the outside world. Novartis has used acquisitions repeatedly to reshape its portfolio. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarAcquisitions at Roche
Roche has followed a somewhat different pattern. Its most important acquisitions were the majority stake in Genentech in 1990, the full acquisition of Genentech in 2009 and the majority stake in… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSpin-offs as a form of distribution: Alcon and Sandoz
Alongside acquisitions, Novartis has used spin-offs to distribute value to its shareholders. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarTreasury in Basel: cash pooling and in-house banking
Behind the large transactions stands a permanent organisation in Basel that manages the daily finances of the groups. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCurrency risk and the strong franc
Currency management is one of the most important tasks of a Basel treasury. Roche reports its results in Swiss francs, Novartis in US dollars, while a large share of their revenues is earned in US… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe pension funds of the groups
The pension funds of Roche and Novartis belong to the largest corporate pension funds in Switzerland, with assets of many billions of francs each. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarBanks, arrangers and the Swiss capital market
The relationship between the pharmaceutical groups and the banks has changed considerably over the decades. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSustainability-linked finance
In September 2020 Novartis issued a sustainability-linked bond of EUR 1.85 billion, which it described as the first such bond in the healthcare sector. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe corporate law reform of 2023
The revision of Swiss company law that entered into force on 1 January 2023 introduced several instruments relevant to the finance of large listed companies. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSay-on-pay and shareholder engagement
Executive remuneration in the pharmaceutical groups has been a subject of public debate in Switzerland for many years. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSyngenta: finance under Chinese ownership
Syngenta presents a different financial history. The agrochemical company, formed in 2000 from the agribusinesses of Novartis and AstraZeneca and headquartered in Basel, was acquired in 2017 by China… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarLonza: capital expenditure and portfolio pruning
Lonza, which moved its headquarters from Visp to Basel, follows a capital-intensive business model as a contract development and manufacturing organisation for pharmaceutical and biotechnology… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarTax: from Holding Privileges to STAF and Pillar Two — overview and summary
Taxation is the point at which the pharmaceutical industry of Basel meets the state most directly. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarFederalism and the three levels of company taxation
Swiss company taxation rests on three levels. The Confederation levies a direct federal tax on the profit of legal entities at a single proportional rate of 8.5 per cent. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe old cantonal regimes
Before 2020, the harmonisation act allowed the cantons to grant special status to certain companies. Article 28 of the act distinguished three categories. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarPrincipal companies and finance branches
Two further practices completed the picture. Both rested on administrative practice of the Federal Tax Administration and were therefore applicable at the federal level as well. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarWhat the regimes meant for Basel pharma
For Roche and Novartis, the cantonal regimes had a different significance from that which they had for a trading company in Zug. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarEuropean pressure: the state aid dispute from 2005
The first sustained external challenge came from the European Union. Switzerland is not a member of the Union and is not bound by its state aid rules in general. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe OECD, harmful tax practices and BEPS
The OECD added a second line of pressure. Its report on harmful tax competition of 1998 defined criteria for preferential regimes that were considered harmful, such as low or zero effective rates,… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCorporate Tax Reform III and its defeat
The Federal Council presented its first answer in the form of Corporate Tax Reform III, the third major reform of company taxation after those of 1997 and 2008. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSTAF: the federal architecture
The Federal Act on Tax Reform and AHV Financing, known in German as STAF and in English often as TRAF, was adopted by Parliament on 28 September 2018. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarBasel-Stadt's compromise
Basel-Stadt did not wait for the federal vote. After the defeat of Corporate Tax Reform III, the cantonal government negotiated with the political parties, the trade unions and the business… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarBasel-Landschaft and the regional pattern
The neighbouring canton of Basel-Landschaft faced a different situation. Its economy is more diversified in terms of company size, but it hosts important pharmaceutical and chemical sites, notably… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarTransfer pricing of pharmaceutical intellectual property
Beyond statutory rates, the tax position of a pharmaceutical group depends above all on the allocation of profit among the countries in which it operates. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarWithholding tax and capital contribution reserves
Distributions to shareholders raise a separate set of tax questions. Switzerland levies a withholding tax of 35 per cent on dividends paid by Swiss companies. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarRulings practice
Swiss tax practice has long relied on advance rulings. A taxpayer describes a planned transaction or structure to the cantonal tax administration, or to the Federal Tax Administration for federal… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe United States reform of 2017
The most important external influence on the tax position of the Basel groups after 2017 came from the United States. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarPillar Two: the Swiss implementation
The global minimum tax is the most recent stage of the international reform. In October 2021, more than 130 member jurisdictions of the OECD/G20 Inclusive Framework agreed on a two-pillar solution. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe Basel location package
The question was what to do with the money. Several cantons with large multinational groups argued that the minimum tax, while preserving revenue for Switzerland, would weaken its attractiveness… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe dependence of the cantonal budget
Basel-Stadt has one of the highest per capita revenues from company taxation in Switzerland. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCorporate taxation as an expression of cantonal sovereignty
The history traced in this chapter can be read as a contest between cantonal sovereignty and international standards. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarIntellectual Property, Licensing and Biotech Venture Finance — conclusion
The history of Basel's life-sciences industry can be told as a history of intellectual property. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarFrom the imitator's licence to the patent as an asset
Part D described how the Basel dye industry grew up in a country without patent protection for chemical inventions. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe Swiss Patents Act
The Federal Act on Patents for Inventions of 25 June 1954 is the basis of the Swiss patent system, although it has been revised many times since its adoption. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe European Patent Convention and the Unitary Patent
The Convention on the Grant of European Patents was signed in Munich in 1973 and entered into force in October 1977. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe Federal Patent Court
Until 2011 patent disputes in Switzerland were heard by the cantonal courts, which rarely dealt with them and often lacked judges with technical expertise. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSupplementary protection certificates and paediatric extensions
A medicine rarely reaches the market until many years after the patent on its active substance has been filed, because the clinical trials and the authorisation procedure take a long time. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarData exclusivity under the Therapeutic Products Act
Patent protection is supplemented by a separate right that is often of equal commercial importance: the protection of the documentation submitted to obtain marketing authorisation. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe price of a medicine in Switzerland
Once Swissmedic has authorised a medicine, its reimbursement by the compulsory health insurance depends on its inclusion in the list of specialities, a positive list maintained by the Federal Office… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarConfidential price models
The most significant change in Swiss pricing practice of the last decade has been the spread of confidential price models. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarAmerican pricing pressure since 2025
For the Basel groups, the decisive market is the United States, which accounts for close to half of the global sales of Roche and Novartis. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarGenerics and biosimilars
The value of a patent becomes visible when it expires. After loss of exclusivity, sales of a small-molecule medicine can fall by most of their volume within months as generic manufacturers enter the… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCompulsory licences, TRIPS and the waiver debate
The Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, concluded as part of the Uruguay Round in 1994, obliged all members of the World Trade Organization to grant patents for… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarLicensing as the currency of the industry
Few medicines sold by the Basel groups today were discovered entirely in their own laboratories. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarMilestones, royalties and the structure of deals
The financial terms of a pharmaceutical licence reflect the uncertainty of drug development. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarIP holding companies and the patent box
The location of intellectual property within a group has major tax consequences, as chapter III of this part shows in detail. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarValuing intellectual property
The valuation of a pharmaceutical patent or of a development project is one of the most demanding tasks in corporate finance. Several methods are used, often in combination. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe Actelion story
The most important biotech success in the history of the Basel region is Actelion. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarBasilea, Santhera, Polyphor and the listed biotechs of the region
Actelion was not the only biotech company founded in the Basel area around the turn of the century. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarVenture capital in Basel
The venture capital landscape in Basel is closely linked to the large groups. The Novartis Venture Fund, founded in 1996, is one of the oldest corporate venture funds in the pharmaceutical industry… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe Swiss venture capital gap and the Zukunftsfonds debate
Although Switzerland is one of the most innovative countries in the world according to international rankings, its venture capital market is small relative to the size of its economy and its research… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarInfrastructure for start-ups: the innovation park and BaseLaunch
The Basel region has invested in infrastructure to support young life-sciences companies. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarUniversity spin-offs and technology transfer
The University of Basel and the Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Basel are important sources of new companies. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarLegal structuring of financing rounds
A Swiss biotech start-up is usually organised as a company limited by shares under the Code of Obligations. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarEmployee participation and tax rulings
Equity participation is an essential part of the remuneration of employees in biotech start-ups, because these companies cannot pay salaries comparable to those of the large groups. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCrowdfunding and tokenised equity
New forms of financing based on digital technologies have also reached the life sciences, although they remain marginal compared with venture capital. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCompliance: Anti-Bribery, Sanctions and Export Control — overview and summary
The preceding chapters of Part G have described the life sciences industry of Basel as an industrial base, as a borrower and issuer on the capital markets, as a taxpayer and as an owner and licensor… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCompliance as a headquarters function
In the large Basel groups, compliance is organised as a central function with a reporting line to the executive committee and to a committee of the board of directors. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSwiss anti-bribery law
The Swiss Criminal Code (StGB) has contained a modern set of bribery offences since 2000, when the provisions were revised in preparation for the ratification of the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCorporate criminal liability under Article 102 StGB
Swiss criminal law has recognised the liability of companies since 2003. Under Article 102 paragraph 1 StGB, a company is liable for a felony or misdemeanour committed in the exercise of commercial… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe OECD Convention and the Working Group on Bribery
Switzerland signed the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions in 1997 and ratified it in 2000. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarExtraterritorial regimes: the FCPA and the UK Bribery Act
The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977 is the oldest and most influential law against foreign bribery. It contains two sets of provisions. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarThe Novartis resolutions of 2020
The most significant enforcement cases involving a Basel group in recent years concerned Novartis. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarHealthcare compliance: integrity and transparency
The sale of medicines differs from the sale of most other goods because the person who decides on the purchase is often not the person who pays for it. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarData protection and clinical trials
Clinical research generates some of the most sensitive data that a company can hold. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSanctions law: the Embargo Act and SECO
The legal basis for Swiss sanctions is the Federal Act on the Implementation of International Sanctions of 2002, usually called the Embargo Act. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarRussia 2022 and the humanitarian exemption
Medicines, medical devices and agricultural products occupy a special position in almost every sanctions regime. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarIran and the Swiss Humanitarian Trade Arrangement
The case of Iran shows how secondary sanctions of the United States affect companies outside its territory. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarExport control: goods control and dual-use items
Export control law regulates the export of goods and technologies that can be used for military purposes or for the production of weapons of mass destruction. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarChemical and biological weapons conventions
The Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993, which entered into force in 1997, prohibits the development, production, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons. Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarInvestment screening and the Syngenta question
The acquisition of Syngenta by ChemChina, which was announced in February 2016 and completed in 2017 for more than 40 billion US dollars, was one of the largest foreign acquisitions in Chinese… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarSupply chain due diligence after the Responsible Business Initiative
On 29 November 2020 Swiss voters decided on the Responsible Business Initiative, which would have made Swiss companies liable for human rights and environmental violations by companies they control… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarWhistleblowing
Most compliance cases begin with information from inside the company. Employees who observe misconduct are often the only source that can reveal it, which is why enforcement authorities in the United… Read more Basel · Life Sciences as a Financial PillarCompliance practice in Basel
The legal fields discussed in this chapter are rarely separate in practice. A bribery investigation in a foreign subsidiary may reveal sanctions risks, because the distributor involved belongs to a… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Rhine Ports and Logistics — conclusion
The Rhine ports connect landlocked Switzerland with the seaports of the North Sea and form a trimodal hub in which ship, rail and road meet. Read more Basel · The DreilandSwitzerland's gateway to the sea
Switzerland is a landlocked country whose economy depends on imports of energy, raw materials and food and on exports of high-value goods. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Swiss Rhine Ports as an institution
For most of the twentieth century, the ports were run separately by the two half-cantons. Basel-Stadt administered Kleinhüningen and the St. Read more Basel · The DreilandKleinhüningen, Birsfelden and Muttenz
The port of Kleinhüningen, on the right bank of the Rhine in the north of Basel-Stadt, is the largest and the most central of the Swiss Rhine ports. Read more Basel · The DreilandWhat the river carries
The volumes handled in the Swiss Rhine ports fluctuate from year to year with the water level of the river, the state of the economy and the prices of energy. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Mannheim Act and the freedom of navigation
The Rhine is one of the oldest international rivers in the legal sense. In 1815 the Congress of Vienna proclaimed the principle of freedom of navigation on the rivers that separate or cross several… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Central Commission in Strasbourg
The Central Commission for the Navigation of the Rhine (CCNR) is often described as the oldest international organisation in the world, since its origins go back to the Congress of Vienna and it held… Read more Basel · The DreilandCrews, vessels and dangerous goods
Navigation on the Rhine is a regulated profession. A boatmaster who steers a vessel on the Rhine requires a qualification recognised under the Rhine regime, traditionally the Rhine patent… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Swiss flag at sea
The Rhine connects Switzerland with the seaports, while the oceans beyond are the domain of the Swiss maritime fleet. Read more Basel · The DreilandShipping finance
The financing of ships is a specialised branch of banking that combines asset finance with the particular risks of the shipping market. Read more Basel · The DreilandLow water and the climate risk
The navigability of the Rhine depends on the level of the river, which in turn depends on precipitation and on the melting of snow and glaciers in the Alps. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe logistics companies of Basel
The port and the customs station gave rise to a logistics industry whose companies became international leaders. Danzas is the oldest example. Read more Basel · The DreilandPharmaceutical logistics and the cold chain
The life sciences industry has shaped a specialised segment of the logistics market in Basel. Read more Basel · The DreilandRail, the Gotthard and the Rhine–Alpine corridor
Basel is a hub on the most important north-south freight corridor of Europe, which links the North Sea ports with the ports of northern Italy and the industrial regions of Lombardy and Piedmont. Read more Basel · The DreilandGateway Basel Nord and the third port basin
The project Gateway Basel Nord envisages a trimodal container terminal on the former freight station area of the Deutsche Bahn in the north of Basel, connected to a new third port basin (Hafenbecken… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe port and the city: Klybeck and the Rhine quays
The port and the city compete for the same land. The Klybeck quay and the Westquai peninsula at Kleinhüningen lie close to the residential districts of Kleinbasel. Read more Basel · The DreilandCustoms warehousing and open customs warehouses
The customs status of goods in the port determines their tax burden and the procedures that apply to them. Read more Basel · The DreilandContracts and liability on the river
The carriage of goods on the Rhine is governed by a combination of international conventions, national law and standard terms. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe river after Schweizerhalle
The Rhine that flows past the ports today differs profoundly from the river of 1986. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Trinational Economy: Cross-Border Workers and the EuroAirport — overview and summary
Basel lies at a point where three national legal orders meet within a single urban area. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Dreiland as a functional region
Geographers describe the area around Basel as a functional region, meaning a territory whose inhabitants live, work, shop and spend their leisure time across administrative boundaries. Read more Basel · The DreilandRegio Basiliensis and the beginnings of institutional cooperation
The modern institutions of cross-border cooperation began with a private initiative. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Trinational Eurodistrict Basel
The local authorities of the agglomeration first organised their cooperation in 1995 under the name Trinationale Agglomeration Basel (TAB), a project body that prepared studies on transport, urban… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Upper Rhine Trinational Metropolitan Region
A broader structure was created in December 2010, when representatives of the political, economic, scientific and civil-society actors of the Upper Rhine signed a declaration establishing the… Read more Basel · The DreilandCross-border commuters: numbers and structure
The most tangible expression of the trinational economy is the daily movement of cross-border commuters, known in Switzerland as Grenzgänger and in France as frontaliers. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe G permit and the Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons
Under Swiss immigration law, a foreign cross-border commuter needs a cross-border commuter permit, the permit G (Grenzgängerbewilligung). Read more Basel · The DreilandSocial security coordination
The free movement of persons would be of little use if workers lost their social security rights when crossing a border. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe framework agreement on telework
The solution took the form of a multilateral framework agreement concluded under Article 16 paragraph 1 of Regulation 883/2004, which allows the competent authorities of two or more states to agree… Read more Basel · The DreilandUnemployment and health insurance
Unemployment insurance follows a special rule for frontier workers. Article 65 of Regulation 883/2004 provides that a wholly unemployed frontier worker receives unemployment benefits from the state… Read more Basel · The DreilandTaxing commuters from Germany: Article 15a
The taxation of employment income across borders is governed in principle by Article 15 of the OECD Model Tax Convention, under which salaries are taxable in the state where the employment is… Read more Basel · The DreilandTaxing commuters from France: the agreement of 1983
The Franco-Swiss double taxation convention of 9 September 1966 follows the general principle of taxation in the state of employment. For frontier workers it refers to special agreements. Read more Basel · The DreilandHome office after the pandemic: the arrangements of 2023
The spread of home working after 2020 raised a question that the drafters of 1983 could not have foreseen. Read more Basel · The DreilandWages, prices and the franc
Commuting across the border is driven by differences in wages and prices. Swiss nominal wages are considerably higher than those in Baden and much higher than those in Alsace, while living costs,… Read more Basel · The DreilandShopping tourism across the border
The reverse flow is that of Swiss consumers shopping in Germany and France. Prices for food, clothing, cosmetics and household goods are considerably lower in the neighbouring countries, which leads… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe EuroAirport: a treaty airport
The EuroAirport Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg is one of the most unusual airports in the world. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Swiss sector and the dispute over tax and labour law
The binational structure has been a source of legal disputes for decades. The 1949 Convention regulated the construction and operation of the airport but did not exhaustively determine which law… Read more Basel · The DreilandCargo, passengers and the rail link
The EuroAirport handles passenger and cargo traffic. Before the COVID-19 pandemic it served about nine million passengers a year, a figure reached again after the recovery, which placed it third… Read more Basel · The DreilandRail and tram across the border
Basel's rail network has been trinational since the nineteenth century. Part D has described the Badischer Bahnhof, the German railway station on Swiss soil, which was built under the treaty of 1852… Read more Basel · The DreilandSpatial planning, housing and the IBA Basel
The development of the trinational region raises questions of spatial planning that no single authority can answer. Read more Basel · The DreilandEmployers and the accompanying measures
Employers in Basel who employ cross-border commuters face a range of legal obligations. Read more Basel · The DreilandAdvising across three jurisdictions
The trinational economy generates a steady demand for legal and tax advice that spans the three countries. Read more Basel · The DreilandCustoms, Export Control and Sanctions at the Border — overview and summary
Every chapter of this book has passed, at some point, through a customs office. The Kaufhaus of the medieval city collected tolls on the goods that crossed the Rhine bridge. Read more Basel · The DreilandFrom the Kaufhaus to the border office
The continuity is worth stating at the outset because it explains much of the present. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Federal Office for Customs and Border Security
The authority responsible for the Swiss side of the border is the Federal Office for Customs and Border Security (FOCBS), known in German as the Bundesamt für Zoll und Grenzsicherheit (BAZG) and in… Read more Basel · The DreilandDaziT and Passar: digital customs
The transformation of the customs administration was driven above all by a digital programme called DaziT, a name formed from the Romansh word for customs, dazi, and the letter T for transformation. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe new customs legislation
The Customs Act of 18 March 2005, in force since 1 May 2007, has governed Swiss customs law for almost two decades. Read more Basel · The DreilandSwitzerland outside the customs union
The most basic legal fact about the Basel border is that it is a customs border in the full sense. Read more Basel · The DreilandSchengen without a customs union
Since Switzerland joined the Schengen area, the control of persons at its borders with Germany and France has followed the logic of an internal Schengen border. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe crossings of the Dreiland
The physical border around Basel is long and permeable. Within a radius of a few kilometres, the city has more than a dozen road crossings with Germany and France, several railway lines, two… Read more Basel · The DreilandPolice and customs cooperation across three borders
Customs control in a trinational region depends on cooperation between administrations that answer to different governments. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe customs security agreement and the authorised economic operator
After the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, customs administrations worldwide introduced advance security declarations, under which goods must be notified electronically before they arrive or… Read more Basel · The DreilandExport control at the border: the role of customs
Part G explained that Swiss export control law distinguishes between war material, governed by the War Material Act, and dual-use goods and specific military goods, governed by the Goods Control Act… Read more Basel · The DreilandLicensing, catch-all and the ELIC system
Licence applications for dual-use goods are submitted to SECO through an electronic platform called ELIC, which has replaced paper procedures for most export control matters. Read more Basel · The DreilandSeizure and criminal proceedings in Switzerland
When customs officers detect a suspected violation of export control or sanctions law, the first step is usually the provisional seizure of the goods. Read more Basel · The DreilandSanctions circumvention and the Russia diversion problem
Since 2022, the enforcement of the Russia sanctions has become the dominant theme of border control in Europe. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe German side: the Zoll and the Außenwirtschaftsgesetz
On the German side of the border, customs is a federal responsibility exercised by the Generalzolldirektion in Bonn and by regional main customs offices. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe French side: the douane in Mulhouse
The French customs administration, the Direction générale des douanes et droits indirects (DGDDI), is organised in interregional and regional directorates. Read more Basel · The DreilandCash and bearer instruments at the border
Cash controls have become an important part of border enforcement in the context of anti-money laundering policy. Read more Basel · The DreilandCrypto-assets and digital assets at the border
Crypto-assets and digital assets pose a conceptual challenge to border control. A person who holds a significant amount of bitcoin or stablecoins on a hardware wallet or in a memorised seed phrase… Read more Basel · The DreilandCultural property at the border
Cultural property occupies a special place among the goods that customs officers control. Read more Basel · The DreilandCounterfeits and intellectual property
The protection of intellectual property at the border is another task that the customs administration performs on behalf of private rights holders. Read more Basel · The DreilandVAT, e-commerce and shopping tourism
Value added tax is the largest source of revenue collected at the Swiss border, much larger than customs duties. Read more Basel · The DreilandFree zones and open customs warehouses
The customs law also provides for places where goods may be stored without being released into free circulation. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe World Customs Organization and international standards
The rules applied at the Basel border are shaped by international standards that are developed far from the Rhine. Read more Basel · The DreilandPractice at the border
The legal structure described in this chapter is complex, but its daily operation is largely invisible. Read more Basel · The DreilandFairs: from Mustermesse to Art Basel — overview and summary
Fairs have accompanied the history of Basel since the late Middle Ages. Part A described how the Emperor Frederick III granted the city a fair privilege in 1471, at a moment when the fairs of Geneva… Read more Basel · The DreilandFrom the privilege of 1471 to the Herbstmesse
The privilege of 1471 allowed Basel to hold two annual fairs, of which the autumn fair has survived to the present day. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Schweizer Mustermesse of 1917
The modern fair business of Basel began in the middle of the First World War. Although Switzerland was neutral, it was surrounded by belligerents. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe fairground on the Kleinbasel side
The fairground on the Messeplatz is today one of the most visible pieces of architecture in Kleinbasel. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe economics of a trade fair
A fair company sells space, attention and time. Its principal revenue comes from exhibitors, who rent floor space by the square metre and pay additional charges for services such as electricity,… Read more Basel · The DreilandBaselworld: the rise of the watch and jewellery fair
Watches were present at the Mustermesse from the beginning. In 1917 a section of the fair was devoted to the products of the Swiss watch industry, which was then concentrated in the Jura arc from… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe decline and end of Baselworld
From the mid-2010s, that risk materialised. The watch industry faced a fall in demand after the Chinese anti-corruption campaign of 2012 to 2014 had reduced the market for luxury gifts, and the… Read more Basel · The DreilandMCH Group: from cooperative to listed company
The organisational history of the fair company reflects the transformation of a public-private institution into a commercial group. Read more Basel · The DreilandArt Basel: the foundation of 1970
Art Basel was founded in 1970 by three Basel gallerists: Ernst Beyeler, Trudl Bruckner and Balz Hilt. Read more Basel · The DreilandUnlimited, Miami Beach, Hong Kong, Paris and Qatar
From the 1990s onwards, the fair developed new formats and new locations. In 2000, Art Basel introduced Unlimited, a section in a separate hall for large-scale works, installations, sculptures and… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe economics of an art fair
The Basel edition of Art Basel today presents roughly 280 to 290 galleries from about forty countries, selected from a much larger number of applicants, and attracts in the order of ninety thousand… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Art Basel and UBS Art Market Report
Since 2017, Art Basel and UBS have published an annual report on the global art market, written by the cultural economist Clare McAndrew and her firm Arts Economics. Read more Basel · The DreilandSatellite fairs and the fair week
Art Basel has generated an ecosystem of satellite fairs that take place in the same week. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe fair as a financial event
Art Basel is an art fair, yet it is also a financial event. The collectors who buy at the fair are often clients of private banks, family offices and wealth managers, many of whom view their… Read more Basel · The DreilandArt as an asset class
Part B described the double portrait of the Basel money changer Jakob Meyer zum Hasen, painted by Hans Holbein the Younger in 1516, and the later Darmstadt Madonna commissioned by the same patron. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe law of the fair: exhibitor contracts and admission
Participation in a fair is governed by a contract between the organiser and the exhibitor, usually composed of an application form, general terms of participation and specific regulations for the… Read more Basel · The DreilandTemporary import, customs and value added tax
Works of art and other goods brought to a fair from abroad must pass through customs. Read more Basel · The DreilandResale right: why Switzerland has none
One legal difference between Switzerland and the European Union is of particular importance for the art market: the artist's resale right, or droit de suite. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe pandemic and the online viewing room
The pandemic of 2020 and 2021 interrupted the fair business for almost two years. Art Basel Hong Kong in March 2020 was cancelled, followed by the Basel edition in June 2020 and the Miami Beach… Read more Basel · The DreilandSoft power and the name of the city
Art Basel has made the name of the city known among people who might otherwise never have heard of it. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe practitioner's view
For a lawyer or wealth adviser, the fair week is a time of concentrated activity. Clients who buy at the fair may need advice on the structure of the acquisition, on the place of storage, on the… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Art Market: Money Laundering, Freeports and Provenance — overview and summary
Every June, collectors, dealers, curators and advisers from all continents gather in the halls of the Messe Basel for Art Basel, the fair whose history the preceding chapter traced from the… Read more Basel · The DreilandCharacteristics of the art market
By the standards of trade in movable goods, the art market is a large market, although its volumes appear modest beside those of finance. Read more Basel · The DreilandInternational findings on money laundering risk
For many years the Financial Action Task Force addressed the art market only in passing, in its typology reports on trade-based money laundering and on high-value goods. Read more Basel · The DreilandSwiss regulation of art dealers
The Swiss Anti-Money Laundering Act applies primarily to financial intermediaries. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe European and British regimes
The European Union chose a broader approach. The Fifth Anti-Money Laundering Directive of 2018 added two categories of obliged entities that matter for the art market. Read more Basel · The DreilandSanctions and the art market
The relationship between art and sanctions became a public topic in July 2020. In that month the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the United States Senate published a staff report entitled… Read more Basel · The DreilandFreeports: function and law
A freeport, in Swiss terminology a customs free warehouse (Zollfreilager), is a secured area in which goods may be stored without being imported into the Swiss customs territory. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Geneva Freeport
The best known Swiss freeport is that of Geneva, operated by Ports Francs et Entrepôts de Genève SA, a company majority-owned by the Canton of Geneva. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Basel Freilager on the Dreispitz
Basel has its own tradition of free warehouses. The Dreispitz, an area of about fifty hectares on the border between the city of Basel and the municipality of Münchenstein in Basel-Landschaft, served… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe 2016 reform of the law on free warehouses
The Swiss Federal Audit Office examined the customs free warehouses in a report published in 2014. Read more Basel · The DreilandOpacity illustrated: the Bouvier–Rybolovlev dispute
The most widely reported illustration of the questions raised by freeports is the long dispute between the Swiss art dealer and storage entrepreneur Yves Bouvier and the Russian businessman Dmitry… Read more Basel · The DreilandProvenance and art looted under National Socialism
Provenance is the documented history of a work's ownership from its creation to the present. Read more Basel · The DreilandThe findings of the Independent Commission of Experts
The historical background was examined by the Independent Commission of Experts Switzerland – Second World War, known after its chairman Jean-François Bergier, whose work on gold and banking was… Read more Basel · The DreilandBasel cases: the 1939 purchases and the Glaser collection
Basel's public collection has its own chapter in this history. In 1939 the Kunstmuseum Basel, under its new director Georg Schmidt, acquired a group of important modern works that the National… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Gurlitt bequest
The most prominent Swiss case of recent years concerns Bern. In 2012 German customs and prosecutors found a large collection of works in the Munich apartment of Cornelius Gurlitt, son of the art… Read more Basel · The DreilandAntiquities and the Cultural Property Transfer Act
The trade in antiquities poses different questions. Here the concern lies in the illicit excavation of archaeological sites and the export of objects in breach of the laws of their countries of… Read more Basel · The DreilandThe Basel Art Trade Guidelines and industry standards
The Basel Art Trade Guidelines of the Basel Institute on Governance, mentioned in Part E, extend the logic of these duties to the money laundering and corruption risks of the art market. Read more Basel · The DreilandDue diligence in practice
For a buyer, a seller or a bank financing a purchase, due diligence in the art market comprises three layers. The first concerns the parties. Read more Basel · The DreilandArt-secured lending and art funds
Works of art have increasingly become collateral for loans. Private banks lend against valuable collections, typically at a loan-to-value ratio well below that for securities, because valuation is… Read more Basel · The DreilandTokenisation, NFTs and crypto-assets and digital assets
The newest chapter in the financialisation of art is tokenisation. A work can be held by a company whose shares are issued as tokens on a blockchain, which allows investors to acquire fractions of a… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskBaloise and the Consolidation of Swiss Insurance — conclusion
The history of Basel insurance in the past half century has been a history of consolidation. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskFrom the history to the present
Part D, Chapter IV, traced the origins of insurance in Basel to the fire that destroyed a large part of the town of Glarus in May 1861. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe holding structure of the Bâloise group
The legal structure of the Basel insurance group took its modern form in the second half of the twentieth century. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskExpansion into Germany, Belgium and Luxembourg
Germany had been the most important foreign market of the Basel insurers since the nineteenth century. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskBanking within an insurance group
Baloise was one of the few Swiss insurance groups that owned a bank. Baloise Bank SoBa, based in Solothurn, emerged from the acquisition of the Solothurner Bank SoBa by the group around the turn of… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSimply Safe and the ecosystem experiment
In 2016, Baloise launched a strategy under the name Simply Safe. The strategy aimed at simplifying the group, increasing profitability and preparing the company for the digital transformation of… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskInvestor pressure and the strategic review
The disappointing performance of Baloise attracted the attention of activist investors. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe Swiss insurance market around 2000
The consolidation of Swiss insurance in the first quarter of the twenty-first century cannot be understood without the crisis that struck the industry around 2001 and 2002. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskWinterthur, AXA and foreign ownership
The crisis also triggered the first large sale of a Swiss insurer to a foreign group. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskHelvetia and its Basel roots
Helvetia, the partner of Baloise in the merger of 2025, was a company from St Gallen whose origins went back to the same years as those of the Basel insurers. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskMutuals and cooperatives
The consolidation of Swiss insurance has not affected all forms of ownership equally. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe merger of Helvetia and Baloise
On 22 April 2025, Helvetia and Baloise announced their intention to merge. The two boards described the transaction as a merger of equals that would create the second largest insurance group of… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskRationale: scale, cost and technology
The two companies justified the merger primarily with the advantages of scale. Insurance is a business with high fixed costs for information technology, actuarial and risk management functions,… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskApprovals and completion
The merger required the approval of the shareholders of both companies, of the Swiss Competition Commission, of FINMA and of the supervisory and competition authorities in the other countries where… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskGovernance, seats and shareholders
The governance of the merged group reflected the principle of equality between the two partners. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskConsequences for employment in Basel and St Gallen
The cost synergies announced at the time of the merger implied a substantial reduction of employment. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskReinsurance and Basel
Reinsurance, the insurance of insurers, is concentrated in Switzerland in Zurich, where Swiss Re has its head office. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe Basel insurance cluster
Insurance in Basel is more than one large group. The city is home to the head office of the merged Helvetia Baloise group, to regional offices of other Swiss and foreign insurers, to brokers serving… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCantonal building insurance
The protection of buildings against fire and natural hazards in Switzerland is organised in two different systems. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe natural hazards pool
In the cantons without a public monopoly, private insurers cover buildings and contents against natural hazards under a regime defined by federal law. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe earthquake of 1356 and seismic risk today
On 18 October 1356, an earthquake destroyed much of Basel. Contemporary sources describe the collapse of churches, towers and houses, followed by a fire that burned for days in the wooden city. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe unfinished debate on earthquake insurance
Despite the known hazard, there is no general obligation in Switzerland to insure buildings against earthquakes. A few cantonal building insurers provide limited cover. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskHealth insurance in Basel
Health insurance, the largest line of insurance by number of policyholders, is organised under a separate regime. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskInsurance Supervision: ISA and the Swiss Solvency Test — conclusion
Swiss insurance supervision has developed from the early federal supervision of 1885 to a modern risk-based regime administered by FINMA. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskA long-term promise under supervision
An insurance contract is a promise whose value depends almost entirely on the future solvency of the party that gives it. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskFrom the Federal Office of Private Insurance to FINMA
For more than a century, Swiss insurance supervision was the task of a specialised federal office. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe Insurance Supervision Act of 2004
The Insurance Supervision Act of 17 December 2004 entered into force on 1 January 2006 and replaced the act of 1978 together with several older statutes. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe Insurance Supervision Ordinance and FINMA's circulars
The VAG is a framework act. Its operational detail is set out in the Insurance Supervision Ordinance of the Federal Council (AVO) of 9 November 2005 and in the FINMA Insurance Supervision Ordinance… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe architecture of the Swiss Solvency Test
Before the SST, Swiss insurers calculated their solvency under the so-called Solvency I rules, which were modelled on the European directives of the 1970s. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskMarket-consistent valuation and the risk margin
The SST requires a market-consistent valuation of all assets and liabilities. Assets traded in liquid markets are valued at market prices. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskStandard models and internal models
To calculate the target capital, the insurer must model the possible changes in its risk-bearing capital over one year. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe SST in practice: 2008 and the years of low interest rates
The first test of the SST came with the financial crisis of 2007 to 2009, which hit during the transitional period. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskPublic disclosure and the Financial Condition Report
For many years, the results of the SST were known only to the supervisor and the insurer. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskTied assets
A central and specifically Swiss instrument of policyholder protection is the tied assets (gebundenes Vermögen). Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskGovernance, risk management and ORSA
The VAG of 2004 already required insurers to have an organisation that enables them to identify, assess, monitor and control their risks. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe revision of 2024
The VAG of 2004 was revised in a project that began with a consultation in 2016 and ended with the adoption of the amending act by Parliament on 18 March 2022. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskRestructuring and resolution of insurers
The most significant innovation of the revision was the introduction of a restructuring regime. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskInsurance intermediaries
The VAG distinguishes between tied and untied insurance intermediaries. An untied intermediary, typically a broker, is in a relationship of trust with the policyholder and acts in the policyholder's… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe Insurance Contract Act and its revision
The Insurance Contract Act of 1908, whose origins were described in Part D, governs the contractual relationship between the insurer and the policyholder. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskHealth insurance between FOPH and FINMA
Swiss health insurance is divided between two systems with different supervisors. Compulsory basic health insurance under the Federal Health Insurance Act of 1994 is provided by health insurers… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSwitzerland and the European Union: the 1989 Agreement
The relationship between Swiss insurance law and European law rests on a treaty concluded more than three decades ago. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSolvency II equivalence
When the European Union adopted Solvency II in 2009, it provided for the recognition of the solvency regimes of third countries as equivalent in three areas: the supervision of reinsurance activities… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe "Swiss finish" debate
The term "Swiss finish" is usually associated with the banking sector, where Switzerland imposed capital requirements on its large banks that exceeded the Basel minimum. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe United Kingdom and the Berne Financial Services Agreement
After the United Kingdom left the European Union, Switzerland and the United Kingdom began to negotiate an agreement on financial services based on the mutual recognition of their regulatory regimes. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe IAIS and the Insurance Capital Standard
Part F of this book described the IAIS, which has its seat in Basel, together with its standards, including the Insurance Core Principles, ComFrame and the Insurance Capital Standard (ICS) adopted in… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskNatural catastrophes and climate risk
Natural catastrophe risk has always been central to the SST, which requires insurers to model losses from storms, floods, hail and earthquakes. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskLong-term guarantees and the interest rate cycle
The years of low interest rates exposed a structural weakness of life insurance: the guarantee of a minimum interest rate over decades. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSupervision of a Basel group
The merger of Baloise and Helvetia, discussed in chapter I of this part, brings these themes together. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskLife Insurance Wrappers for Private Clients — conclusion
The life insurance wrapper shows how a nineteenth-century instrument of popular saving has become an instrument of cross-border wealth planning. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskFrom popular saving to private placement
Part D traced how life insurance became, in the second half of the nineteenth century, one of the principal forms of saving for the Swiss population, and how the actuarial tradition of Basel shaped… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskWhat a wrapper is
A life insurance wrapper is a life insurance contract, usually concluded against a single premium, whose value depends on the performance of assets allocated to the policy. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe parties and their roles
A life insurance policy involves up to four persons whose roles must be kept apart. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskDedicated funds and investment freedom
The core of a private placement policy is the fund to which it is linked. Insurers distinguish between external funds, which are investment funds open to the public and selected by the policyholder… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskLuxembourg and the triangle of security
Luxembourg has become the largest European centre for cross-border unit-linked life insurance. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskLiechtenstein and the EEA passport
Liechtenstein offers a second European base for wrapper insurers. As a member of the European Economic Area, it applies the Solvency II framework and its insurers may sell policies in the European… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskIreland, Bermuda and the wider market
Ireland is the third European location for cross-border life insurance. Irish insurers, many of them subsidiaries of British groups, sell unit-linked policies into the United Kingdom and continental… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSwiss insurers and the Basel players
Swiss insurance groups have played a prominent role in the cross-border wrapper market. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCustodian banks in Basel, Zurich and Geneva
The custodian bank holds the assets of the dedicated fund in the name of the insurer. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskBeneficiary designation under Swiss law
Swiss law grants the policyholder wide freedom to designate beneficiaries. Under the Insurance Contract Act, the policyholder may designate a third party as beneficiary without the consent of the… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskProtection against creditors
The protection of life insurance policies against the policyholder's creditors is among the features most often cited in favour of the instrument. Under Swiss law, two rules achieve this effect. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSuccession and the compulsory share
The statement that insurance proceeds fall outside the estate is correct as a description of the beneficiary's direct claim against the insurer. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskDivorce and matrimonial property
In divorce, a life insurance policy is treated as an asset of the spouse who holds the policy, regardless of the designation of beneficiaries. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSwiss taxation
The Swiss tax treatment of life insurance distinguishes between periodic premium policies and single premium policies, and between policies that serve pension provision and those that do not. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskGerman taxation
Germany is the most important foreign market for policies administered from Basel, with rules more detailed than those of any other country examined here. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskFrance and Italy
France is the country in which life insurance has the most prominent place in wealth planning. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSpain and the United Kingdom
Spain treats life insurance gains as savings income on surrender or maturity. Unit-linked policies benefit from deferral only if the policyholder cannot choose individual assets and the investments… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe United States
The United States has the strictest and most formalised rules. A contract counts as life insurance for federal tax purposes only if it meets the definition of the Internal Revenue Code, which… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCRS, FATCA and the end of discretion
The automatic exchange of information has changed the market more profoundly than any tax provision. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskMisuse and enforcement
The most prominent case of enforcement concerned the Swiss Life group. In May 2021, Swiss Life Holding and its subsidiaries in Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Singapore entered into a deferred… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskDue diligence under the Anti-Money Laundering Act
Swiss insurers that offer direct life insurance or sell or distribute shares in collective investment schemes are financial intermediaries under the Anti-Money Laundering Act. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskProduct rules: IDD, PRIIPs and the FinSA regime
Within the European Union, life insurance policies with an investment component are insurance-based investment products. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskProspectus liability and the information duties of insurers
The information that the insurer provides about the product is of particular importance for wrapper policies, since the policyholder bears the investment risk and depends on accurate statements about… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskPortability and change of residence
A wrapper policy is designed for the tax law of a particular country. When the policyholder moves to another country, the policy may lose its advantages or acquire disadvantages. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskPension Funds and Investment Foundations — overview and summary
Swiss pension funds hold more capital than any other group of domestic investors. Their combined assets exceed the annual economic output of the country, while the sums they manage on behalf of… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe three-pillar principle and its constitutional basis
The Swiss pension system rests on a principle that was written into the Federal Constitution by popular vote on 3 December 1972. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe BVG of 1982 and the architecture of the second pillar
The Federal Act on Occupational Retirement, Survivors' and Disability Pension Plans (BVG in German, LPP in French) was adopted on 25 June 1982 and entered into force on 1 January 1985. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskVested benefits and the mobility of pension capital
The original BVG did not ensure that an employee who changed jobs could take the full value of his or her pension savings to the new employer. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe conversion rate and the minimum interest rate
Two parameters dominate the economics of the compulsory minimum. The first is the minimum conversion rate, which determines the annual pension paid for each franc of retirement capital. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskReforms at the ballot box: from 2010 to 2024
The history of attempts to adjust the conversion rate is a history of defeats. On 7 March 2010, voters rejected a reduction of the rate from 6.8 to 6.4 per cent by a majority of about seventy-three… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskAHV 21 and the thirteenth pension
The first pillar has followed its own path. On 25 September 2022, voters accepted the reform AHV 21 by a narrow margin. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe landscape of Swiss pension funds
The number of pension funds has fallen steadily for decades. In the late 1980s there were several thousand institutions, many of them small company funds. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt
The pension fund of the canton of Basel-Stadt, the Pensionskasse Basel-Stadt (PKBS), is the largest pension institution in the region outside the corporate sector. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe Basellandschaftliche Pensionskasse
The neighbouring canton followed a similar but distinct path. The Basellandschaftliche Pensionskasse (BLPK) insures the employees of the canton of Basel-Landschaft, of most of its municipalities and… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCorporate funds and collective foundations in Basel
The company pension funds of the large Basel employers are among the most important institutional investors in the region. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe investment rules of the BVV 2
The investment of pension fund assets is governed by the Ordinance on Occupational Retirement, Survivors' and Disability Pension Plans (BVV 2), in particular its Articles 49 to 59. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe prudent person and the extension of limits
The quantitative limits are not as rigid as their wording suggests. Article 50 paragraph 4 BVV 2 allows a fund to extend the investment possibilities beyond the limits if its investment regulations… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskInvestment foundations
Investment foundations (Anlagestiftungen) occupy a special place in the Swiss pension system. They are foundations that pool the assets of pension funds for collective investment. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSupervision: the OAK BV and the BSABB
The supervision of occupational provision was restructured by the amendment of the BVG of 19 March 2010 on the structural reform, which entered into force in stages in 2011 and 2012. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskInsurers and the full-insurance model
Swiss life insurers have offered occupational pensions since long before the BVG. Under the full-insurance model (Vollversicherung), an employer joins a collective foundation sponsored by an insurer,… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe legal quote and the price of guarantees
The participation of insurers in occupational provision is regulated by a special rule intended to prevent them from retaining too large a share of the profits. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskLow interest rates, negative rates and the technical interest rate
From 2015 to 2022, Swiss pension funds operated in an environment without historical precedent. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCoverage ratios and restructuring
The coverage ratio expresses the relationship between the assets of a pension fund available to cover its liabilities and the actuarially required pension capital. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskStewardship, voting duties and ESG
Pension funds are among the largest shareholders of Swiss listed companies, which gives their voting behaviour considerable weight. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskReal estate, infrastructure and venture capital
Swiss real estate occupies a central place in pension fund portfolios. Through direct holdings, investment foundations and listed or unlisted real estate funds, pension funds are among the largest… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCross-border workers and pension capital
The Basel region employs more cross-border workers than almost any other part of Switzerland. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskWealthy individuals and 1e plans
Occupational pensions also serve as a planning instrument for persons with high incomes. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCaptives and Alternative Risk Transfer — overview and summary
When an industrial group decides how to protect itself against the loss of a factory, a recall of a medicine or a claim from a patient in a clinical trial, it faces a choice that goes back to the… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskWhat a captive is
A captive insurance company is an insurance or reinsurance undertaking that belongs to a group whose principal business lies outside insurance and whose purpose is to insure the risks of that group. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskFronting, retention and the international programme
The fronting insurer carries a risk that is easy to overlook. It is liable to the insured subsidiaries in full, whatever the captive pays it under the reinsurance contract. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskOrigins: Fred Reiss, Ohio and Bermuda
Self-insurance by industrial companies is an old practice, since some trading companies in Europe established their own insurers in the nineteenth century. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe captive domiciles
A captive domicile competes on several dimensions at once. Groups look for a supervisor that understands captives and applies proportionate capital and reporting requirements. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskSwitzerland as a captive domicile
Switzerland is a significant captive domicile of the second rank, behind Luxembourg, Ireland and Bermuda. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskWhy the Basel groups use captives
The pharmaceutical and chemical groups of Basel face a risk profile that makes captives attractive. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskProduct liability, clinical trials and environmental risks
Product liability is the risk that most occupies the insurance managers of the pharmaceutical groups. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCaptives and transfer pricing
Because a captive receives premiums from companies of the same group, every premium is a related-party transaction. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskControlled foreign company rules and the global minimum tax
Groups whose parent company is resident in a country with controlled foreign company rules must also ask whether the profits of a captive abroad will be taxed at home. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskRegulation and governance of captives
Whatever its domicile, a captive is a regulated insurer. It needs a licence, minimum capital, a board, a risk management function, an actuary, an auditor and, in most domiciles, a compliance… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskFrom captives to the capital markets
Captives are the oldest instrument of what the insurance industry calls alternative risk transfer, a term that covers all techniques for transferring or financing risks outside traditional insurance… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCatastrophe bonds and insurance-linked securities
A catastrophe bond is issued by a special purpose vehicle, usually domiciled in Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, Ireland or another jurisdiction with suitable legislation. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskParametric insurance, industry loss warranties and sidecars
The catastrophe bond is the best known instrument of insurance-linked finance, but it is accompanied by several others. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskInsurance-linked securities managers in Switzerland
Switzerland has become one of the principal centres for the management of insurance-linked securities. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCatastrophic transport and logistics risks
Part D described how a landlocked city became a centre of transport insurance in the nineteenth century. Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskFine-art insurance
Part H noted that the works shown at Art Basel each June are insured from the wall of the lender to the booth and back, and that the fair concentrates an insured value of billions of francs in a few… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskCyber risks and the new captives
Cyber risk has become the fastest growing new line of business for captives. Commercial cyber insurance is expensive, limits are small in relation to the potential losses of large groups and the… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskClimate risk, sustainability and the protection gap
Climate change affects every instrument discussed in this chapter. Insured losses from natural catastrophes have exceeded one hundred billion US dollars in several recent years, according to Swiss… Read more Basel · Insurance, Reinsurance and RiskThe practice of structuring
For the advisers of an industrial group, the establishment of a captive is a project that combines insurance, regulatory, tax and corporate law. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityGerman, Swiss German and Baseldytsch — conclusion
German in Basel exists in three layers that coexist without merging. Swiss Standard German is the language of laws, contracts, judgments and newspapers, a full standard variety with its own spelling… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe linguistic situation of German-speaking Switzerland
Visitors who arrive in Basel from Germany expect to find themselves in a German-speaking city. In a formal sense they are right. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentitySwiss Standard German and its Helvetisms
The written language of German-speaking Switzerland is Standard German, but it is a Standard German of its own kind. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityBaseldytsch: a Low Alemannic city dialect
The Swiss German dialects belong to the Alemannic group of Upper German dialects, which extends from Alsace and Baden-Württemberg across German-speaking Switzerland to Vorarlberg in Austria. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Daig and the sociology of the dialect
Within the city, the dialect has long been socially differentiated. The older literature distinguishes between the speech of the old patrician families, often called Dalbe-Dytsch after the St. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFasnacht, Schnitzelbängg and Hebel
No institution illustrates the importance of the dialect for the identity of Basel more clearly than the Fasnacht, the carnival that begins with the Morgestraich at four o'clock in the morning of the… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe legal framework of language use
Language in Switzerland is governed by a federal framework that leaves most practical decisions to the cantons. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityCourts, administration and the language of proceedings
The language of proceedings in Swiss civil courts is determined by the Civil Procedure Code, which since 2011 has replaced the twenty-six cantonal codes. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentitySwiss legal German and German legal German
The difference between Swiss and German legal German goes deeper than the vocabulary of everyday Helvetisms. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityLanguage and the labour market
Language is a powerful sorting device in the labour market of Basel. Job advertisements for positions with direct customer contact often require "very good German skills", sometimes adding that… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityDialect and trust in client relationships
In client relationships, language serves as a signal of proximity. A Basel client who opens an account with the cantonal bank or with a local private bank expects to be addressed in dialect. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentitySchool policy, media and digital communication
The school system reproduces and modifies the linguistic situation of the canton. Swiss German children learn Standard German at school as the language of reading and writing. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFrench and the Alsatian Neighbour — overview and summary
Anyone who walks from the Marktplatz of Basel to the French border at Saint-Louis needs well under two hours, and a tram covers the distance in about twenty minutes. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityA city at the edge of the French-speaking world
Basel lies at the north-western corner of German-speaking Switzerland, where the Rhine turns north and three states meet. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityHuguenots, silk and the Église française
After the Reformation of 1529 had made Basel a Protestant city, the wars of religion in France during the second half of the sixteenth century brought the first waves of French-speaking Protestants… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFrench as the language of commerce and the patriciate
When French became the language of European courts, diplomacy and polite society in the eighteenth century, the merchant aristocracy of Basel followed this fashion with enthusiasm. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityMulhouse: a Swiss ally in Alsace
The relationship between Basel and Mulhouse forms a special chapter in the French history of the region. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityAlsace between France and Germany: 1648 to 1945
Few European regions have changed sovereignty as often as Alsace. In the Peace of Westphalia of 1648, the Habsburgs ceded their rights in Upper Alsace and the Sundgau to the French crown, although… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityLanguage policy after 1945
The experience of annexation shaped the linguistic attitudes of Alsace after 1945 more deeply than any earlier change of sovereignty. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityElsässisch and Baseldytsch
Linguists classify the dialects spoken in most of Alsace as Alemannic, the same group to which the dialects of German-speaking Switzerland, Baden and Swabia belong. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe decline of German among younger Alsatians
The intergenerational transmission of Alsatian has declined sharply since 1945, with a further acceleration in recent decades. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe French Republic and its regional languages
The legal framework for these efforts is set by the French state, which has defined itself through the French language since the Revolution. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Collectivité européenne d'Alsace and bilingual schooling
The administrative map of Alsace has changed twice in the last decade. The territorial reform of 2015 merged the regions of Alsace, Lorraine and Champagne-Ardenne into a single large region, which… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFrench in Switzerland: a national language
On the Swiss side of the border, French holds a strong constitutional position. Article 4 of the Federal Constitution of 1999 names German, French, Italian and Romansh as the national languages. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityBasel on the language border
The proximity of the French-speaking parts of Switzerland gives Basel a regional relationship with the Romandie that no other large German-speaking city shares to the same extent. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFrench in federal institutions and in finance
In the federal capital, French is an everyday working language. Federal acts are published in German, French and Italian, with all three versions equally authoritative. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFrench speakers in Basel's economy
The pharmaceutical and life sciences groups of Basel employ large numbers of French speakers. Some come from the Romandie, many from France, and a considerable number commute daily from Alsace. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityLanguage as a barrier in the cross-border labour market
Outside the large groups, language remains a serious barrier. Small and medium-sized firms in Basel, care homes, hospitals, craft businesses and retail shops expect German and often an understanding… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFrench law for Basel practitioners
Many residents of Basel own property in Alsace. Some have bought holiday homes in the Vosges or the Sundgau, while others live in Alsace and work in Basel. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe droit local alsacien-mosellan
The most interesting legal feature of the neighbourhood is the local law of Alsace-Moselle, the droit local alsacien-mosellan. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityUniversities and culture across the language border
Higher education is one of the fields in which the language border has become a resource. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe canton's external relations
For a city-state that borders two foreign countries along most of its boundary, foreign relations are a matter of daily administration. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityEnglish as the Working Language of Pharma and the BIS — overview and summary
A visitor who walks from the railway station of Basel to the round tower of the Bank for International Settlements, continues to the Novartis Campus on the Rhine and ends the day at the Biozentrum of… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityA fifth language in a quadrilingual country
Switzerland describes itself as a country with four national languages, German, French, Italian and Romansh. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe constitutional and statutory frame of language
The legal framework within which English operates in Switzerland rests on three principles. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Bank for International Settlements as an anglophone island
When the Bank for International Settlements was founded in 1930, the governors who negotiated its creation in Baden-Baden and at The Hague came from Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Basel Committee and the language of global standards
The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, founded by the central bank governors of the Group of Ten at the end of 1974, has published its standards in English since its earliest documents. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityEnglish in the pharmaceutical groups
The two large pharmaceutical groups of Basel both work in English at the level of their global management, although they reached this position along different paths. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityRegulatory affairs, clinical trials and the language of science
The importance of English for the pharmaceutical industry stems from the structure of drug regulation as much as from corporate culture. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe University of Basel and international academic life
The University of Basel, founded in 1460 and described in Part A as the oldest university in Switzerland, taught in Latin for most of its early history. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityInternational schools and expatriate communities
The families of the international staff of the BIS, the pharmaceutical groups and the research institutes need schools for their children. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityEnglish before Swiss courts
For a long time, a foreign company that brought a commercial dispute before a Swiss court had to conduct the proceedings in the official language of the canton and translate its evidence into German,… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityArbitration in English
International arbitration is the field in which English has most clearly become the working language of Swiss legal practice. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityEnglish in financial regulation and capital markets
The Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority FINMA issues its ordinances, circulars and decisions in the official languages. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityCompany law and the commercial register
Swiss company law lets companies choose English for many purposes. A stock corporation may conduct board meetings in English, keep its board minutes in English and use English as its internal… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityLegal English and civil-law concepts
The widespread use of English in Swiss commercial and financial practice creates a legal problem that goes beyond translation. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentitySchools, Swinglish and the language debate
The rise of English has provoked one of the most intense political debates in recent Swiss history: the question of which foreign language children should learn first at school. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityLanguage and power
The spread of English raises questions of fairness and power that scholars have discussed for decades. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityMultilingual Contract Drafting — overview and summary
The three preceding chapters of this Part described the languages that are spoken, written and heard in Basel: the German of the canton's institutions, the Baseldytsch of its streets, the French of… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityWhy multilingual contracts arise in the Basel region
The most visible source of multilingual contracts in Basel is the life sciences industry. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityLanguage clauses and the prevailing version
A contract may be drafted in one language only, in one language with courtesy translations or in two or more versions that the parties sign together. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityInterpretation under Swiss law
Swiss contract law starts from Article 18 paragraph 1 of the Code of Obligations, according to which the true and common intention of the parties must be ascertained when assessing the form and terms… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityGerman law: §§ 133 and 157 BGB and standard terms
German law contains two general provisions on interpretation. Section 133 of the Civil Code requires that, in interpreting a declaration of intention, the true intention is to be sought and the… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFrench law after the 2016 reform and the Toubon law
The reform of French contract law by the ordinance of 10 February 2016, which entered into force on 1 October 2016, rewrote the provisions of the Civil Code on interpretation. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityEnglish law: text, context and the absence of good faith
English law is the most frequently chosen governing law in international commercial contracts, including many contracts that Basel companies conclude with foreign partners. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityConcepts that do not translate
The deepest difficulty of multilingual drafting lies in legal concepts that have no exact equivalent in the other language because they belong to a different legal system. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityChoice of law, jurisdiction and arbitration
Since the governing law determines which of the rules of interpretation described above apply, it is the most important single decision in a multilingual contract. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFrontier workers and consumers
Employment contracts with frontier workers combine the questions of governing law, mandatory law and language. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityTranslators, notaries and the commercial register
Translations of contracts are needed for many official purposes, such as court proceedings, filings with authorities and registrations of land or companies. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityMachine translation, AI and professional secrecy
Machine translation and generative artificial intelligence have changed the practice of multilingual drafting within a few years. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityLessons from multilingual legislation
Contract drafters can learn from the experience of legislators who work in several languages. The European Union publishes its legislation in all its official languages, which are equally authentic. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityDrafting practice
The first decision in any multilingual transaction concerns the working language of the negotiation and the authoritative language of the contract. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityCulture as Soft Power: Museums, Foundations and Patronage — conclusion
Basel's culture is the product of repeated decisions to turn private wealth into public goods. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentitySoft power and a city
The American political scientist Joseph Nye introduced the term soft power at the end of the Cold War to describe the ability of a state to obtain what it wants through attraction, as distinct from… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Amerbach Cabinet as civic founding act
Part B told the story of the Amerbach family, the printers and jurists of the humanist period, and of the purchase of their collection by the city and the university in 1661. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Kunstmuseum Basel: buildings and collections
The holdings of the cabinet passed through several buildings before they found a permanent home. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Picasso vote of 1967
The episode that most clearly expresses the civic character of Basel's patronage took place in 1967. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Emanuel Hoffmann Foundation and the Schaulager
Part E introduced the Emanuel Hoffmann Foundation as an example of how a family can hold art in a charitable structure. Its cultural significance reaches further. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityMuseum Tinguely and corporate patronage
The second great contribution of the Roche group and its founding family is the Museum Tinguely, opened in 1996 on the bank of the Rhine in the Solitude park, next to the Roche site. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityFondation Beyeler and the private museum
The Fondation Beyeler in Riehen has already appeared in this book twice, as the creation of the art dealer who co-founded Art Basel and as an example of a charitable foundation. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityA landscape of museums
Beyond these flagships, Basel has a density of museums that is unusual for a city of its size. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityMusic: Paul Sacher and the Basel commissions
Basel's cultural reputation rests on music as much as on the visual arts. Here too one patron stands out. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Paul Sacher Foundation
Sacher's most durable contribution may be an archive. In 1973 he established the Paul Sacher Foundation, which opened its research centre in 1986 in the Haus auf Burg on the Münsterplatz, a few steps… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityTheatre, orchestras and the cultural budget
Music and theatre depend on public money far more than museums. The Theater Basel, which combines opera, drama and ballet in one house, is the largest cultural institution of the region by budget and… Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Kulturvertrag between the two Basels
The cultural institutions of the city serve the whole region, while their costs fall largely on Basel-Stadt. Read more Basel · Language, Border and IdentityThe Daig, discretion and the GGG
Part C described the old families of Basel, the Daig, and the culture of discretion that governed their wealth. That culture also governs how they give. Read more