A current look at Open Finance in Switzerland
This is one of two blog posts in which we take a look at the current state of Open Finance. In this post, Stefan Knaus will start in Switzerland and give a brief update from a survey conducted by OpenBankingProject.ch on the maturity, relevance and success factors of Open Finance in Switzerland. In the next blog post, Friedrich Wazinski will take a look at the international activities of Open Finance and derive learnings for Switzerland.
In an international comparison, Switzerland is still at an early stage in the implementation of open finance. While regulatory frameworks and coordinated initiatives are promoting progress in markets such as the UK, the EU and Brazil, Switzerland has so far relied on a voluntary, market-oriented approach.
At the same time, external pressure is increasing. New regulations such as PSD3, PSR and FIDA, the growing importance of innovative payment service providers and the increasing spread of embedded finance models pose additional challenges for Swiss financial institutions. Without coordinated measures, there is a risk of market fragmentation and a loss of competitiveness in the European environment.
Nevertheless, open finance also opens up considerable opportunities. Financial institutions have the opportunity to secure their customer interfaces, develop new digital business models and strengthen customer loyalty through innovative services. However, this requires the targeted further development of the technological, organizational and regulatory foundations.
In Switzerland, various organizations and industry associations are committed to the implementation of Open Finance. These include the State Secretariat for International Financial Matters (SIF), Swiss Banking Association (SBA), Swiss FinTech Innovations (SFTI), Open Wealth Association and OpenBankingProject.ch.
Together with 5 partners (Ergon Informatik, Finnova, Finstar, the University of St. Gallen and the Business Engineering Institute St. Gallen) and 16 members, OpenBankingProject.ch is committed to the implementation of Open Finance in Switzerland. A core element of the initiative is the provision of widely accepted and interoperable building blocks (e.g. APIs) for the implementation of Open Finance in Switzerland. For some time now, the initiative has been focusing on the topic of digital customer proximity, i.e. the networking of the bank in all areas of the customer’s life. In this context, customers can use their bank’s products, services and data and obtain them from other companies via APIs or wallet technologies without barriers in customer journeys.
The OpenBankingProject.ch is currently working with PPI Switzerland on a white paper on open finance in Switzerland, which is due to be published at the end of October 2025. Among other things, the following questions will be analyzed :
- What is the current status of the implementation of Open Finance in Switzerland?
- How is open finance being implemented worldwide and what are the success factors?
- What relevance does open finance have for the competitiveness of the Swiss financial center?
- What are the potentials and risks of open finance for Swiss financial institutions?
- What are the prerequisites for the progress and scaling of open finance in Switzerland?
To substantiate the findings from the study of various publications and academic sources on the topic of open finance, a survey was conducted in the network of the OpenBankingProject.ch over the past weeks. In the process, 59 people from the financial sector and beyond responded. Among others, 23 respondents work for banks and other financial institutions. The remaining participants were divided into the target groups of technology providers, consulting companies, FinTech, RegTech, InsurTech and others.
The first question was about the maturity level of open finance. The 59 participants rated the maturity level of open finance in Switzerland as low to medium with a mean score of 2.51.
In my view, this is a good reflection of the current status of open finance in Switzerland. Around a third of Swiss banks have gained initial experience with open banking use cases by connecting to the bLink open banking platform from SIX. Most banks are currently focusing on the “Multi Banking for Corporate Clients” use case, with the “Multi Banking for Private Clients” use case also set to go live by the end of the year. Some banks, such as Hypothekarbank Lenzburg, are going one step further and are actively trying to expand their existing business model through collaborative partnerships. For example, Hypothekarbank Lenzburg recently entered into a cooperation with the Swiss financial blogger “Finanz Fabio” and its planned budget app “BlueBudget”. Customers of Hypothekarbank Lenzburg will be able to manage their accounts in this app in future. BlueBudget aims to offer end customers a neutral multi-banking application that provides tips and tricks on banking-related areas such as payments and savings.[1]
Discussions with various other banks have revealed that bank customers are now also actively asking for open banking use cases. In particular, external asset managers (Open Wealth) and SMEs (Multi Banking) are among the customer groups that have developed the corresponding awareness and acceptance for Open Banking Use Cases. In these two banking areas (Payments, Wealth), there is also a certain degree of API standardization. The market (e.g. SIX bLink) and banks are pushing ahead with the technical foundations for operating Open Finance. However, we are still a long way from innovative FinTechs being able to establish API connectivity with all Swiss banks and enable their end customers to use their account information and initiate payments without barriers, “à la PSD2”.
How is the current level of maturity in Switzerland assessed in comparison to other countries? Here too, across all target groups (banks, FinTechs, technology providers, consulting companies and others), it is clear that open finance in Switzerland is still lagging behind. With an average score of 2.14, the participants rated the overall maturity level of open finance in Switzerland as low compared to other countries. The “Banks” and “FinTechs” target groups in particular gave low answers to this question.
But is the current situation a problem? Do we even need open finance for a competitive Swiss financial center? The short answer is yes. With an average score of 3.76, all target groups rated open finance as having medium to high relevance for the long-term competitiveness of the Swiss financial center.
How can we now work together to promote open finance in Switzerland? Do we need selective interventions from the regulator or can the market participants align themselves in such a way that significant progress can be made together over the next few years? These and other questions are currently being discussed with various experts in order to identify recommendations for action for the progress and scaling of open finance in Switzerland. The white paper will be published at the end of October 2025 and presented at the 13th member event of the OpenBankingProject.ch on November 12, 2025 at Ergon in Zurich.
[1] “BlueBudget” cooperates with Hypothekarbank Lenzburg AG
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