Switzerland DLT Act

The Act introduced rules for ledger-based securities in the Swiss Code of Obligations. A ledger-based security is a right registered in a qualifying securities ledger and exercisable or transferable only through that ledger. The statutory model focuses on control, integrity, disclosure of ledger functionality, and the ability of creditors to view relevant entries without relying on a third party.

This provision is central to Switzerland’s tokenisation framework because it gives market participants a civil-law route for issuing rights directly on a distributed or otherwise electronic register. The Act also includes rules on transfer, effects, collateral, cancellation, information duties, and issuer liability for inaccurate or misleading information about the security or ledger.

The Act amended the Financial Market Infrastructure Act to add a licensing category for DLT trading facilities. These facilities support multilateral trading of DLT securities and may, depending on their design, admit certain non-professional participants, hold DLT securities in central custody, or clear and settle transactions under uniform rules. FINMA is the licensing and supervisory authority for this market-infrastructure category.

DLT trading facilities are subject to selected trading-venue requirements, including self-regulation, orderly trading, transparency, trading supervision, and suspension rules. The Act therefore links blockchain-based market infrastructure to the existing Swiss financial-market framework rather than creating an unregulated trading venue category.

The Act also addresses bankruptcy and custody questions. It provides for the surrender of certain crypto-based assets claimed by third parties when statutory allocation and readiness conditions are met, and it adds access-to-data rules where data is subject to a bankrupt estate’s power of disposal. These provisions are relevant to custody, safekeeping, and infrastructure arrangements, but they do not remove the need to assess other applicable Swiss law.

Parliament adopted the DLT Act on 25 September 2020. The referendum deadline expired on 14 January 2021. Selected civil-law and financial-law amendments became effective on 1 February 2021, including provisions enabling ledger-based securities. The Federal Council then brought the remaining provisions and the associated blanket ordinance into force on 1 August 2021.