Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and Technology — a part of the book Zurich as an International Financial Centre by Dr Alexander Ressos.
Part J examines the technological transformation of the financial centre. Within a decade, Switzerland created a fintech licence, adapted its private law, insolvency law and market infrastructure law to distributed ledger technology and licensed the first banks built around crypto-assets and Digital Assets. Zug gave its name to the Crypto Valley, while Zurich supplied the banks, the exchange, the universities and the technology companies on which the ecosystem depends. Artificial intelligence now raises the next set of questions, from the governance of models in banks and insurers to the talent that a financial centre must attract.
Chapter I sets out the legal framework: the sandbox and the fintech licence, FINMA’s guidance on tokens and stablecoins, the DLT Act of 2020 and the reform of the licensing regime that was still pending in September 2026. Chapter II describes the ecosystem between Zug and Zurich, the tokenisation of financial assets on the infrastructure of SIX, the SNB’s wholesale central bank money pilots, stablecoins and the compliance and asset-recovery questions that crypto-assets and Digital Assets raise. Chapter III examines artificial intelligence research, the presence of global technology companies in Zurich, FINMA’s expectations for the use of AI and the Swiss approach to regulating it.
Together these chapters show a financial centre that has used technology to renew itself. Part K turns to the geography of Zurich’s business and to the German-speaking region it serves.
This part belongs to Zurich as an International Financial Centre by Dr Alexander Ressos, published here in full, section by section.
Fintech licence, sandbox and the DLT Act — overview and summary
Few areas of Swiss financial law have changed as quickly as the rules that govern financial technology. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologySwitzerland's regulatory approach to fintech since 2016
The starting point of the modern Swiss fintech regime was a decision of the Federal Council on 2 November 2016. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe fintech licence under Article 1b of the Banking Act
The third element of the Federal Council's programme, the fintech licence, was adopted by Parliament on 15 June 2018 as part of the legislative package that also produced the Financial Services Act… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyFINMA's token taxonomy: initial coin offerings and stablecoins
The years 2017 and 2018 brought a wave of initial coin offerings to Switzerland. Project teams from around the world established foundations in Zug and companies in Zurich, raised funds by issuing… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe DLT Act of 25 September 2020
The Federal Council's report of December 2018 led directly to a legislative project. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyCrypto banks, custody, staking and crypto funds
On 26 August 2019 FINMA granted banking and securities dealer licences to two newly founded institutions specialising in crypto-assets and Digital Assets: SEBA Crypto AG in Zug and Sygnum Bank AG in… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe reform of 2025 and 2026: payment instrument institutions and crypto institutions
By 2025 the limits of the Swiss approach had become visible. The European Union had adopted a comprehensive regime for crypto-assets, the United States had enacted federal legislation on payment… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologySwitzerland and the European MiCA regime
The European Union's Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) entered into force in June 2023. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe taxation of crypto-assets and Digital Assets
Tax law was the second field in which Swiss authorities had to find answers for crypto-assets without specific legislation. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyAutomatic exchange of information on crypto-assets
The tax transparency regime that Switzerland accepted after the end of banking secrecy, described in Part G, rested on the Common Reporting Standard of the OECD. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe practitioner's perspective
The body of law described in this chapter has generated a distinct kind of legal work in Zurich. At its centre stands the token classification opinion. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyLegacy and outlook
The Swiss fintech regime of the decade from 2016 to 2026 leaves a mixed but largely positive legacy. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyCrypto Valley, tokenisation and digital market infrastructure — overview and summary
Few developments in the recent history of Swiss finance began as far from the banking houses of the Bahnhofstrasse as the one described in this chapter. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe origins of Crypto Valley in Zug
The canton of Zug had prepared the ground for Crypto Valley long before anyone spoke of blockchains. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe ICO boom of 2017–2018 and its disputes
An initial coin offering, or ICO, allowed a project team to collect funds from the public by issuing tokens on an existing blockchain, usually Ethereum, in exchange for bitcoin or ether. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyFoundations as vehicles and the supervisory authority
The Swiss foundation under Articles 80 to 89a of the Civil Code is an independent pool of assets dedicated to a particular purpose. It has no members and no owners. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe ecosystem today: Zug, Zurich and Lugano
The most frequently cited source on the size of Crypto Valley is the annual report of the Zug investor CV VC, which for several years has counted the blockchain firms of Switzerland and Liechtenstein… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyCrypto banks, bank offerings and brokers
The step from start-up to bank was taken in August 2019. On 26 August of that year FINMA granted banking and securities dealer licences to two newly founded institutions, SEBA Crypto AG in Zug and… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyTokenisation and digital market infrastructure
The most ambitious project of the Swiss financial centre in this field was built by SIX, the operator of the Swiss stock exchange and of the central securities depository SIX SIS, which is described… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyStablecoins and the Swiss franc
Stablecoins are tokens whose value is linked to a currency or another asset and which are intended to serve as a means of payment or settlement on a blockchain. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyCrypto compliance: money laundering, the travel rule and sanctions
The general framework of Swiss anti-money laundering law, described in chapter I.III, applies to crypto-assets without major adaptation. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyTracing, seizure and insolvency
The transparency of public blockchains makes crypto-assets easier to trace than many traditional assets, provided that the investigators can link addresses to persons. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe practitioner’s perspective
The questions that clients bring to lawyers in Zurich and Zug about token projects have changed since 2017, although their structure has remained stable. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyLegacy and outlook
Crypto Valley has left a durable mark on the Swiss financial centre. It brought a new industry to a small canton, forced the regulators to develop a vocabulary for a new asset class and led to the… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyArtificial intelligence, big tech and the talent base — overview and summary
A financial centre has always depended on the people who work in it. The merchant bankers of the nineteenth century, the securities traders of the post-war decades and the wealth managers who turned… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe academic foundation: ETH Zurich and the University of Zurich
Any account of artificial intelligence in Zurich begins at ETH Zurich, the federal institute of technology founded in 1855, whose computer science department has supplied the city’s technology… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyBig tech in Zurich
The presence of international technology companies in Zurich has a long prehistory. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyStart-ups and venture capital
The concentration of research and corporate laboratories has produced a lively start-up scene, which is financed by a venture capital market that remains small by international standards. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe talent base
The AI laboratories and the financial institutions of Zurich draw on the same international labour market. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyArtificial intelligence in banking, insurance and compliance
The most reliable picture of AI use in the Swiss financial sector comes from a survey conducted by FINMA between late November 2024 and mid-January 2025 among around 400 supervised institutions,… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyFINMA’s supervisory expectations
FINMA has not issued a circular on artificial intelligence. It has chosen to formulate its expectations within the existing framework of governance and risk management, in line with its… Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyThe Swiss approach to AI regulation
For several years Switzerland watched the development of the EU AI Act without committing itself to a horizontal statute of its own. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyData protection, outsourcing and cloud computing
The revised Federal Act on Data Protection (FADP) entered into force on 1 September 2023. It is technology-neutral and therefore applies directly to AI-supported processing of personal data. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyOperational resilience and cyber risk
AI systems are part of the information and communication technology of an institution, and their failure or manipulation is an operational risk. Read more Zurich · Crypto-Assets and Digital Assets, Fintech and TechnologyLegal technology and the practice of law
The legal profession in Zurich, which serves the financial centre as advisers, litigators and compliance specialists, has adopted AI tools with growing speed. Read more