Understanding investing in Switzerland: the comprehensive guide

The three forms of working together

The law distinguishes three basic forms — with different distributions of decision-making and responsibility:

The three forms in detail — with the complete ladder of duties →

Your rights: what FIDLEG requires of financial service providers

Regardless of whom you work with: FIDLEG gives clients a statutory entitlement to certain services from the provider —

1. Information

   Before the service is provided: details of the firm and its supervisory status, of the ombudsman's office and of the risks — and, where a personal recommendation is made, additionally of the risks and costs of the service and of economic ties to third parties (FIDLEG Art. 8).

2. Assessment

   For advice and asset management, an appropriateness or suitability assessment (Art. 10–12). If the provider considers an instrument not appropriate or not suitable, it must advise against it (Art. 14).

3. Documentation

   Agreed and provided services must be documented; for investment advice, additionally the client's needs and the reasons for every recommendation that leads to a purchase or sale (Art. 15).

4. Cost disclosure

   For most instruments offered to retail clients there is a key information document setting out risks and costs (Art. 58 ff.); it must be easy to understand and clearly distinguishable from advertising (Art. 61).

Advertising must be identifiable as such (FIDLEG Art. 8 Abs. 6 and FIDLEG Art. 68). This guide therefore keeps the two cleanly apart as well: educational content here, the notice about our own service clearly marked at the end of the page.

The cost landscape: visible and less visible

Investing costs money on several levels: service fees (management or advisory fee, custody fee, transaction costs) are usually visible on your statement. Product costs — such as a fund's ongoing charges, expressed in the TER figure — are by contrast charged directly to the fund's assets and appear on no invoice. And the compensation that product providers pay to distributors is not visible at all unless you ask.

The total costs of an investment solution only emerge from all levels taken together. Two guides of their own go deeper:

Understanding investment costs: fee models, TER and cost disclosure →

Less visible costs in bank products: TER, in-house funds and retrocessions →

Retrocessions: the compensation in the background

Retrocessions are payments from product providers to the entity that distributes the product or manages the assets. The Federal Supreme Court has ruled that in an agency relationship such payments belong in principle to the client (duty to surrender under OR Art. 400; BGE 132 III 460) — a waiver is only valid with prior, specific information. Under supervisory law, financial service providers may accept such compensation only if clients have been expressly informed in advance and waive their claim — or if the compensation is passed on in full (FIDLEG Art. 26).

The retrocession case law in detail — including the limitation question →

The main asset classes — what they are

An overview of the building blocks that investment solutions are made of — descriptive, without any allocation:

This overview describes instruments. Which instruments, in which weighting, fit a specific situation is a question for personal advice — which begins where this guide deliberately stops.

Securities in pillar 3a: the special case in the pension guide →

Alternative investments: private equity and cryptocurrencies

Private equity — stakes in unlisted companies — is in Switzerland, via collective vehicles, typically reserved for qualified investors (KAG Art. 98 Abs. 3 for the limited partnership for collective investment schemes; Art. 118a for the L-QIF). Structurally, three characteristics define this form of investment: capital tied up for long periods with lock-up periods, no ability to sell at any time (the illiquidity is recognised in law — KAG Art. 10 Abs. 5 permits exemptions from redemption at any time for precisely that reason) and a risk of loss up to the total loss of individual holdings. For funds for alternative investments, the law requires a notice of the special risks even in advertising (KAG Art. 71 Abs. 3).

We deliberately keep cryptocurrencies brief: FINMA has for years pointed to high price volatility, risks up to total loss, cases of fraud and particular custody risks — most recently in Guidance 01/2026 on the custody of crypto-based assets. The mere purchase and sale of payment tokens is not regulated under financial market law; there is no deposit insurance and no issuer standing behind the value. Nothing more is needed at this point — a deeper treatment is deliberately not part of this guide.

Both paragraphs describe structure and risks. They deliberately contain no statement on whether such investments belong in a portfolio.

Retail client, professional client, qualified investor

FIDLEG divides clients into segments: retail clients enjoy the full level of protection; professional clients (such as financial intermediaries or large companies) a reduced one. Wealthy retail clients can move to the professional segment by declaration (opting out, FIDLEG Art. 5): required are either knowledge from training and experience plus assets of CHF 500'000 — or assets of CHF 2 million.

The law on collective investment schemes ties into this: «qualified investors» are essentially professional clients (KAG Art. 10 Abs. 3) as well as retail clients with a long-term asset management or advisory agreement (Abs. 3ter). Some vehicles — private equity structures, for instance — are open only to this circle. Changing segment lowers the level of protection; it is a deliberate declaration, not a formality.

On our own behalf: how Northlake Partners works when it comes to investing

This section is a notice about our own service — it is advertising on our own behalf and marked as such. The framework: Northlake Partners is not tied to any provider. We work with several asset managers and banks, obtain offers and set them side by side — by structure, terms and total costs across all levels (service, products, custody).

Cost transparency applies to us as well: we disclose how we are remunerated. Third-party compensation is not something we keep — it is disclosed and credited to clients. What you do with a comparison is your decision.