Federal Act
on the Licensing and Oversight
of Auditors
(Auditor Oversight Act, AOA)

In this Act:

a.³

audit ser­vicesmeans:

1.

audits and con­firm­a­tions which in ac­cord­ance with fed­er­al reg­u­la­tions must be con­duc­ted by a li­censed aud­it­or, a li­censed audit ex­pert or an audit firm un­der state over­sight,

2.

audits which in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle. 24, para­graph 1 let­ter a of the Fin­an­cial Mar­ket Su­per­vi­sion Act of 22 June 2007⁴ (FIN­MASA) must be con­duc­ted by a li­censed audit com­pany for reg­u­lat­ory audits;

b.

audit firmmeans a sole pro­pri­et­or­ship, part­ner­ship or leg­al en­tity that is entered in the Com­mer­cial Re­gister and provides audit ser­vices;

c.⁵

pub­lic in­terest en­tit­ies means:

1.

pub­licly traded com­pan­ies in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 727 para­graph 1 num­ber 1 of the Code of Ob­lig­a­tions (CO)⁶,

2.

su­per­vised per­sons and en­tit­ies with­in the mean­ing of Art­icle 3 FIN­MASA which in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 9a of this Act must man­date a li­censed audit com­pany for reg­u­lat­ory audit with an audit in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 24 FIN­MASA.