Legal basis for the resolution of significant group companies

Financial institutions sometimes outsource group-wide functions to dedicated service companies. SFMA can identify subsidiaries of supervised institutions and designate them as significant group companies. This means that these companies fall under SFMA’s remit if there is a risk of insolvency.

In addition to group parent companies, SFMA is also responsible for the insolvency of significant group companies of supervised institutions.

In Switzerland, this applies to particular group companies of banks, insurance companies and financial market infrastructures that perform significant functions for activities requiring authorisation. The functions that can lead to designation as a significant group company include the following especially (non-exhaustive list):

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SFMA designates the significant group companies as soon as they are identified and publishes them.

Legislation provides for the coordinated resolution (restructuring or bankruptcy) of banks, insurance companies or financial market infrastructures (licence holders) and significant group companies in the event of insolvency under SFMA’s remit.

The legal basis is provided by the Banking Act (based on Art. 2 bis BA), the Insurance Supervision Act (based on Art. 2 a ISA) and the Financial Market Infrastructure Act (based on Art. 3 FinMIA) as well as the implementing ordinances based on them (see also “ Legal basis ”).

There are also special requirements for significant group companies of systemically important banks with regard to capital and liquidity, organisation and the guarantee of permanent service provision (Art. 66 a ff. BO). By analogy, these requirements also apply to significant group companies of systemically important financial market infrastructures (Art. 15 para. 3 FinMIA).