Employment in Financial Services

There is no universal register of all financial services employees. Rather, different Swiss financial market laws provide for a registration requirement that may apply to individual financial service employees. Whether a particular financial market law, and, consequently, a registration requirement, applies to a financial services employee depends specifically on the regulatory status of the employing entity and the particular activity of that employee.

• Also, client advisers of Swiss or foreign financial service providers (eg, investment advisers) may be required to register with the adviser register, unless an exemption applies. Client advisers are the natural persons who perform financial services on behalf of a financial service provider or in their own capacity as financial service providers. Client advisers are entered in the register of advisers if they prove that i) they have sufficient knowledge of the code of conduct set out in the financial services regulations and the necessary expertise required to perform their activities, ii) their employee has taken out professional indemnity insurance or that equivalent collateral exists, and iii) their employee is affiliated with a recognized Swiss ombudsman in their capacity as a financial service provider (if such affiliation duty exists).

Furthermore, “non-tied” insurance intermediaries (ie, persons who offer or conclude insurance contracts on behalf of insurance companies) are required to register with FINMA’s register of insurance companies. To register, persons must inter alia prove that they have sufficient qualifications and hold professional indemnity insurance or provide an equivalent financial surety. “Tied” intermediaries will no longer be able to register voluntarily in the FINMA register (unless this is required by the respective country of operation for activities abroad).

There is no public register of authorised individuals.

As a general principle, supervised companies are required to ensure that persons holding, in particular, executive, overall management, oversight or control functions fulfil the requirements of the “fit and proper” test. Consequently, such persons must be of good repute and can guarantee compliance with applicable laws and regulations.

If a person cannot guarantee that the regulatory requirements are fulfilled at all times (eg, because of a material breach of its duties) the employing entity and its audit companies may be required to immediately report to FINMA, respectively, any incident that is of significance.

Both the DFSA General Rulebook and FSRA General Rulebook provide that where an authorised firm requests the withdrawal of an authorised individual, they must provide to the regulator details of any circumstances in which they consider the individual is no longer fit and proper.  Where the individual is to be dismissed or has requested to resign, the firm must provide to the regulator a statement of the reason, or reasons, for the dismissal or resignation.

In addition, the DFSA and FSRA General Rulebooks contain broad obligations on any authorised firm to report to the regulator if it becomes aware of a range of occurrences, including any matter which could have a significant adverse effect on the authorised firm’s reputation, or a matter in relation the authorised firm which could result in serious adverse financial consequences to the financial system or to other firms, or a significant breach of a rule by the authorised firm or its employees.