Ordinance
on Financial Institutions
(Financial Institutions Ordinance, FinIO)

(Art. 45 Fin­IA)

¹The min­im­um cap­it­al of se­cur­it­ies firms must amount to at least CHF 1.5 mil­lion and be paid up in full. This amount must be main­tained at all times.

²In the case of com­pan­ies formed us­ing a con­tri­bu­tion in kind, the value of the as­sets con­trib­uted and the ex­tent of li­ab­il­it­ies must be veri­fied by a li­censed audit firm. This also ap­plies to the con­ver­sion of an ex­ist­ing com­pany in­to a se­cur­it­ies firm.

³In the case of se­cur­it­ies firms in the form of a part­ner­ship, cap­it­al is deemed to be:

a.

the cap­it­al ac­counts; and

b.

the as­sets of part­ners with un­lim­ited li­ab­il­ity.

⁴As­sets in ac­cord­ance with para­graph 3 may only be coun­ted to­wards the min­im­um cap­it­al re­quire­ment if a de­clar­a­tion is provided to the ef­fect that:

a.

in the event of li­quid­a­tion, bank­ruptcy or pro­bate pro­ceed­ings, such as­sets shall be sub­or­din­ate to the claims of all oth­er cred­it­ors; and

b.

the se­cur­it­ies firm un­der­takes:

1.

neither to net such as­sets with its own claims nor to se­cure them with its own as­sets,

2.

without the pri­or con­sent of the audit firm, not to re­duce any of the cap­it­al com­pon­ents to the ex­tent that the min­im­um cap­it­al re­quire­ment is no longer met.

⁵The de­clar­a­tion in ac­cord­ance with para­graph 4 is ir­re­voc­able. It must be made in writ­ing or in an­oth­er form demon­strable via text and filed with the audit firm.

⁶FINMA may al­low se­cur­it­ies firms in the form of a part­ner­ship to provide, in­stead of min­im­um cap­it­al in ac­cord­ance with para­graphs 3 and 4, col­lat­er­al of at least CHF 1.5 mil­lion, for ex­ample in the form of a bank guar­an­tee or a cash de­pos­it in a blocked ac­count with a bank.

⁷Where there are le­git­im­ate grounds for so do­ing, FINMA can stip­u­late a high­er min­im­um cap­it­al re­quire­ment.