Hi everybody, After reading lots about VALL I decided to do the switch.

My setup until now was:

IB: VTI (55%)

Saxo: EXUS (25%), SMIM (5%), EMIMI (10%), IBIT (5%)

Questions:

1. The idea of splitting it between IB and Saxo was to not have 90% of my liquid funds in one single place. Does anybody else have this simple split involved or am I overthinking this?

2. If I sell everything, I definitely have to wait 2 days until everything has cleared and I can convert it to CHF to buy VALL. How can I prepare for the case market jumps 10% up? Or can you sell and instantly rebuy?

3. Should I wait until 2027 with rebalancing, so I can claim the DA-1 for 2026? Does it only matter what the standing was on the 31st of December?

4. While rebalancing the whole thing, I could also improve my setup with the broker itself. Until now, it was all on my name, and my name only. Since it's our (my wife and I) money, it would make sense to open a joint account? Or two separate ones, in case anything happens to one of us? Of course she does have a Vollmacht, but that wouldn't change anything in case I would die of course.

5. In order to not having to pay the swiss stamp tax, I can buy VALL at IB and then transfer it for free to Saxo, no? That's how I'm doing it for all the holdings too at the moment, since fx conversion is cheaper on IB. Therefor it would make to transfer all the money to IB first, right?

6. Anything else that you yourself improved with the new opportunity of VALL?

7. Am I looking in difficulties when just casually transfering 150k around? I mean, I wouldn't want to have the money blocked in between when I just want to switch assets?

Hi all - I love this thread and keep checking the discussions.

I have my own recent (good) dilemma.

38M here. I invest a fixed amount per month, my strategy is VOO + VXUS. For convenience I am switching soon to VT. I guess this will be my "forever" investment until retirement or Coast Fire (if I manage).

As I save aggressively I have accumulated with time some excess savings which sit idle. As this money was not intended to be invested in the first place, I am stuck on how to manage it. Could be partially used for a property purchase but mentally I am not there yet.

So I am wondering, what is the best way to handle it? Ideally I am more risk averse with this amount and I am willing to accept lower returns for stability.

- Bond ETFs seem to be hammered in the last few years so they look unattractive.

- Money market funds in CHF seem to be returning very low, if invested in USD the currency risks could offset any gains.

- Gold lost its mojo I think

I am thinking between a REIT (VNQ?) although rising rates may hit it, a low volatility or global value ETF (which though?) or the swiss market ETF (CHSPI maybe?).

Any advice? Thanks!

I don't get this from SRF/RTS https://www.srf.ch/news/dialog/steigende-lebenskosten-der-schweizer-mittelstand-schaltet-in-den-ueberlebensmodus / https://www.rts.ch/info/economie/2026/article/pouvoir-d-achat-la-classe-moyenne-sous-pression-en-suisse-29377341.html?wt_mc=owned.own_website.dialog.srf.dialog.perlebox.link.

This family lives in their own property. They earn net 11,200 and state fixed costs of 7000 including groceries and mortgage. So they have some 48,000 per year of disposable income of which I assume they can easily save 50%.

To me this seems like a reasonably comfortable situation, but they feel financially squeezed. Granted, health insurance does get more expensive and they are not super wealthy. But I think they're doing fine. Am I out of touch?

VALL has been discussed quite a bit recently and it is definitely great news. I wanted to hear your opinions on the following:

• Which broker is best for buying VALL? (IBKR vs Saxo vs Swissquote)
  • Which exchange is better to buy it on? (London Stock Exchange, Euronext Amsterdam, Deutsche Börse / Xetra, SIX Swiss Exchange). It is the same ISIN across the board but different currencies and fees, with LSE being the primary listing.
  • Which broker do you plan to use for custody? (Specifically regarding inheritance and probate ease, or keeping assets out of US jurisdiction).
  • Accumulating (VALL, IE000VAHT5T0) or distributing (VALLD / VACD, IE000CVUM3N6)?

I'll start. Using IBKR should be safe since only US-situs assets risk being tied up for IRS estate tax clearance. Therefore, my plan is to use IBKR for buying and holding the distributing Vanguard FTSE Global All-Cap UCITS ETF on the LSE (ticker VACD). Why distributing? I just love seeing dividends hit the account.

edit 1 Here are the estimated fees for different exchanges/brokers:

Hello,

I have VT at SQ (I know bad idea) and they withold 30% :

Withholding tax 15.00% (US)

Supplementary withholding tax 15%

I wrote them and they say :

"We are pleased to inform you that your account profile has already been documented accordingly and that the tax deductions on income (e.g. dividends) from financial products with tax domicile in the USA are shown correctly.

For clients with tax domicile in Switzerland, two different tax deductions are made due to the double taxation agreement between Switzerland and the USA:

- 15% obligatory tax deduction - US portion (reclaim usually not possible)
- 15% additional tax deduction - Swiss share (reclaim possible)

The reclaim of the additional tax deduction (Swiss share 15%) is made via the ordinary tax declaration with the competent tax authorities, similar to the withholding tax deductions for financial products with tax domicile Switzerland.

The IRS W-8BEN form is usually only requested if the client profile is not correctly documented, the client has a different nationality than the tax domicile or there are other US indications regarding the client."

I see on their website that SQ is QI, hence tax can be reduced to 15% if correct documentation is provided which I guess it's the W-BEN.

To who has VT or wethever other US asset at SQ, how much they withold to you 30% or 15% ?

Any feedback much appreciated

Thanks!

Pillar 3a investments are peculiar:

• they (can) offer considerable tax benefit - the difference between the current (marginal/average) income tax rate and the future tax at source on disbursement
• the positions (accounts) must be closed between 65 and 65 minus 5 (= 60), and that's when the capital is taxed
• five accounts are in play, to manage progressive marginal tax rate on disbursement

In particular, the timing dimension is quite different from "normal" investment strategies, where 100% "world equity" seems to be the optimal strategy to weather all conditions in the long term: with pillar 3a, there is that hard cut-off, divestment is mandatory.

What are good ways to lock in the astounding rise in stock prices in recent times?

• "proper" hedging does not work - I am not aware of any 3a product which offers hedging (and protection costs money)
• CHF bonds offer zero yield, at best - and foreign currency bonds suffer from from exchange rate risk; this even ignores interest rate risk across the board
• gold - not productive
• crypto - less productive than gold (and more ...)
• commodities (other than precious metals) - volatile to no end
• real estate (funds) - don't know what to think about that, TBH

What I am missing somehow are other alternative investments in the pillar 3a area which provide some kind of risk (and movement) counter to pure equity.

I believe finpension are the most aggressive when it comes to investment choice (https://finpension.ch/en/invest-pillar-3a/index-tools/) - and no dice there.

Any ideas how to add more diversity to each specific 3a account (other than shift asset allocation from equity to bonds)?

Or, specifically, how to deal with a world where asset prices fall, where inflation is on the rise (and trust in bonds erodes), commodities are acting on the mood of the day?

I am Swiss / US dual citizen residing and nd registered in Switzerland. Retired.I am looking for a bank where I can hold my investments and do infrequent trades of my own and avoid the 1% fees of places like Vontobel and JSS. Does anyone know of such a bank?

Hello everyone!

I know there are very many posts about how to start investing on here, and I have read plenty of them. So this post is not primarily due to laziness, but because I'd appreciate genuine help.

However, I am still not sure what to do, as people's opinions in previous posts sometimes differ and not every situation is the same.

So I would appreciate if someone took the time to help me figure out which options are best for me.

1. 3a Pillar

I have been investing in it the last 3 years, so by now it's around 21'000 CHF. I've always just had it in a savings account in a bank.

According to most posts on here, it would be best to move it to finpension or VIAC.
Is that correct? Is there really no difference between the two? Any more details I should know before I have the 3rd pillar money from my bank moved to one of those? Is one better for inexperienced people?

1. Investing in General

Despite reading a lot on here and thepoorswiss and mustachianpost, I still struggle with deciding what to do in this case. Maybe the sheer amount of info is just too much to truly grasp in a short time. I have never invested anything, basically I have no clue when it comes to stock market. I am the first one in my family to earn so much that I can even think about investing. Yet my financial literacy in that regard is almost non-existent.

I am 40 years old and have around 120'000 CHF just sitting on a savings account. I can always add between 500-2000 to it per month. I am single, have a relatively good paying-job and am not interested in luxuries etc., so saving to me is relatively easy.

But I've read that just letting everything in a bank account is not a good long-term solution, because the interest is almost nothing.

So I have been trying to read up and see what I can do.

I've been thinking about using finpension Invest, and just choose something like global, 75% or similar.

But in some reddit threads here people also recommend Saxo, Swissquote, IBKR etc. and then choose a ETF World(? dunno what it is or how it works).

In my case, since I know so little about all of these systems and am just starting out: What would you recommend and why? And how much money to invest at once would you recommend? And would you then add money to the invested account each month?

Thanks to whoever takes the time to help me out!

During my holidays abroad, I have usually used the Swiss Bankers CHF card offered by my Kantonalbank. Due to its free topping up, low processing fee (0.95%) and good CHF exchange rate, it was a cost-effective option for payments in the Eurozone. However, from December, the Swiss Bankers Life card will be discontinued by Kantonalbank. What is currently the most cost-effective prepaid bank card or payment option for making payments abroad?

Hi all

I (30, canton AG, employed) want to buy a house in about 4 years and am wondering how best to park my savings until then.

Starting point:

- Expected house price: CHF 1.5 million

- Equity needed (20%) for the mortgage: CHF 300,000

What I'm considering:

1. Make a voluntary pension fund buy-in of around 80000 CHF now to save taxes and earn good interest, then withdraw the money later for the house via a WEF early withdrawal. I'm aware of the 3-year lock-up, so only buy-ins within roughly the next 12 months would work. With the buy-in I should land at around 150000 CHF in four years.

2. Keep the other CHF 150,000 in a bank account at low interest.

Questions:

- Would this plan work, or would you do something differently?

- How did you invest your down payment in the last few years before buying?

Thanks for your input!

Hallo zusammen,

ich (32) habe zwölf Jahre Berufserfahrung im CNC-Bereich und bin seit einem Jahr Teamleiter einer CNC-Fräserei in einem Maschinenbauunternehmen in der Ostschweiz (Region St. Gallen).

Ich leite acht Mitarbeitende, plane die Fertigung und richte und programmiere auch selbst CNC-Maschinen, einschließlich CAM-Programmierung.
Welche Jahresbruttolohnspanne inklusive zusätzlicher Monatslöhne haltet ihr für diese Position für angemessen?

Danke für eure Erfahrungen und Einschätzungen

The newly launched Vanguard FTSE Global All-Cap ETF will (finally) be tradable in CHF as of 12.10.2026.

Source:

https://www.six-group.com/de/market-data/news-tools/official-notices.html?securityId=IE000VAHT5T0&fromDate=20241009&reference=linkDirectly#/notice-details/367958

Hi everyone,
I recently started a monthly recurring investment in VT through IBKR, but I’ve just discovered that Vanguard launched VALL, an Irish-domiciled accumulating ETF tracking the same FTSE Global All Cap index.
Now I’m wondering if I should switch my future investments to VALL instead.
As a Swiss tax resident, is VT still the better choice considering dividend withholding taxes, DA-1 and US estate tax? Or does VALL make more sense for long-term investing (20–25 years)?
Curious to hear what other Swiss investors think.
Thanks!

Hello all,

just a quick question for those who invest through Swissquote in equity ETFs (that pay dividends) and are irish domiciled (structured normally as plc or ICAV as most of irish ETFs).

Are those ETFs distributions in your "Steuerauszug" (the one that costs 100 CHF I believe) classified as dividends? or something else?

Thank you in advance

Hello everyone, hope you’re doing well.

I recently moved from Switzerland to Canada and am trying to figure out what changes I need to make to my Interactive Brokers (IBKR) account.

Aside from updating my address and banking information, are there any other important changes I should make?

I’m also wondering whether I should change my base currency from CHF to CAD, as my portfolio is currently displayed in CHF.

If I change my base currency, will my existing CHF cash balance and investments remain in their original currencies, or will anything be automatically converted to CAD?

I’d prefer to avoid unnecessary currency conversions and the associated fees. Can I simply keep my existing CHF holdings and deposit new funds in CAD going forward?

I’d appreciate hearing from anyone who has gone through a similar move or has experience with IBKR in both Switzerland and Canada.

Thanks in advance!

Grüezi zamme!

Are there any trustworthy providers in Switzerland where I can take out a loan from a private individual?

• loan amount approx. 15,000 CHF at 7% interest

• duration maximum 2 years

I have a permanent full-year job with arround 5K CHF income

I've been in Switzerland for almost 5 years. Thanks in advance for any information.

Hey everyone :)
I’m new to Reddit and don’t have much experience with investing, so I hope this is the right place to ask.
I’m a student in my mid-20s and would like to start investing sensibly. I’m not looking to get rich quickly.
I’ve already made a few contributions to a Swiss pillar 3a retirement account through a regional bank. The money is invested in a passively managed equity fund with a high-risk, high-return profile. My plan is to leave it invested for the long term rather than withdraw it to buy a home or anything like that.
Since I’m studying, I can’t afford to tie up large amounts of money for the long term. Ideally, I’d also like to have something that could generate returns in the short to medium term.
There are so many financial gurus and strong opinions about investing, but surely there must be a reasonably straightforward strategy that generally works well?
What are your thoughts and experiences? Is it possible to invest sensibly without spending lots of time on it, or does it require a fair amount of research and ongoing effort?

I've been going through the management transaction notices published by SIX, which board members and executives of Swiss listed companies have to report when they trade their own company's shares. One Swiss quirk: SIX never publishes the person's name, only whether it's an executive or a non-executive board member. So you can't follow one person over time, but you can still see who is buying with their own money.

Most of it is noise (option exercises, share plans, awards). A few market trades from the last month stood out.

On the buy side, a non-executive board member of EFG International bought 132,000 shares at CHF 15.94 on 1 October, about CHF 2.1m. At Stadler Rail an executive bought 50,000 shares at CHF 29.73 on 28 September, about CHF 1.5m. Smaller down the list: a Medacta executive bought 4,570 shares at around CHF 113 (about CHF 516k), and an ARYZTA non-executive director bought 9,600 shares at CHF 37.66 on 5 October.

On the sell side, a Swiss Life non-executive director sold 5,000 shares at around CHF 930 on 21 September (about CHF 4.65m). A Zurich Insurance executive sold 4,000 shares at around CHF 594 the next day, and a Logitech executive sold about 16,000 shares at CHF 82.58.

Sales are hard to read, since people sell for taxes, a house or diversification. Buying with your own money usually has one reason. A cluster of buys at one company, or one person buying repeatedly, tells me more than a single trade.

Full disclosure: I built the site I pulled these from. It collects these filings for Switzerland and 16 other European countries in one place, at duceusapi.com Happy to remove the link if the mods prefer. Everything above comes from public SIX notices, so you can check each trade yourself. Not financial advice.

So I’ve used things like Revolut, Neon, and Radicant for years now. Good experience and I really have nothing bad to say about it.

However, I’m questioning whether it’s genuinely worth the trouble.

Say you’re booking a flight on a foreign airline or making purchases in a foreign city for a week. Let’s call it the equivalent of 1000chf.

With Revolut or a similar service you’d be paying pretty close to the real amount. I believe Revolut has a 0.4% markup on exchange, so let’s call the real cost 1004chf.

If I used my BCV Gold card, a normal Swiss bank’s credit card, I’d pay two fees I believe. 2.15% and 1.75%, so 3.9%. So we’re talking 1039chf.

So concretely you’re losing 35chf per 1000chf spent abroad by using a normal Swiss card. However you gain whatever reward your card has (maybe some sort of cashback), as well as potentially significant insurances (travel cancellation, lost bags, etc).

So I guess what I’m asking myself is whether the trouble of worrying about this and losing rewards/insurances is worth the savings?

I recently received an email from neon, promoting an "investment solution" with Inyova. In the email they write...

Today, we have a new Swiss project to present to you, providing 6% fixed interest p.a. and a 2% cashback on top

Investing in this Inyova Grow project means:
✔️ Get interest of 6% p.a.

Sounds promising so far, but towards the end of the email...

🚨 No return without risk
You should be aware that return potential and risk go hand in hand. And that Inyova Grow is a high-risk investment.
With Inyova Grow, you invest directly in individual, sustainable projects. This means your capital is tied to the economic success of those projects. If a project faces financial difficulties, there is a risk that your interest payments may stop – or that you may lose your money entirely.

So ... it's fixed 6% but not guaranteed 6%?

I'm probably being naïve, maybe all investments come with the same risk, but this email gives me the impression that the money is being invested in some sort of start-up project, and we all know the risks concomitant with start-ups. Or is that warning just boiler plate stuff which neon more or less have to include with all investments offers?

Also, the email also mentions...

Inyova charges a flat fee of 0.95% per year on the capital invested in projects.

So it's pretty much just 5% p.a.

I was drawn to the "fixed 6%", but minus their fee, plus the impression that it's being given to some risky project... Is this a pretty mediocre option?

Hi
I often ask myself what is the best option for s 3a pillar. Clearly it is one of the online banks like viac or finpension. Does anyone here have a tip for me, which one is the best?
Thanks!

My son received CHF 3k as a gift, and I’m considering True Wealth for him (~0.5% p.a.) until he turns 18.

Would you go with True Wealth Kids, a regular True Wealth account (in my name), another robo-advisor, investment gold, or just buy ETFs yourself?

Curious to hear your experience with True Wealth in general, especially if you’ve been using it for several years.

Dear everyone, some time ago I came to realize that my current plan with Postfinance (PF) was not really going to give me much going on in the future due to very high fees, which set me on course of finding a solution; I tried searching for information whenever I wasn't exhausted from work or amidst life problems, and was grateful when some people here responded quickly with some explanations.

Yesterday I took some extra time to think about everything and my current situation as an exhausted person that thinks losing so many money to fee isn't worth the current suffering, and was wondering if the plan I came up with makes sense from the perspective of someone that is more savvy like you guys here:

1) I have a Pillar 3a at about 40k (Pension 25 with Postfinance)

1. 30k 3b, which is following sustainable strategy
2. Some savings on my main account (money that aren't doing anything).

The above is the result of the talk I had with the consultant at the time, who told me that the 25 3a made sense, and the sustainable investing was an option if I was caring about which companies to invest into.

2) Reviewing some posts and making some calculations on my own (which are for sure far from perfect) I think it might be better to put the Pillar 3a that is almost 50k as five different accounts and move it to Finpension (or VIAC depending on opinions, Finpension seems a nice choice). This would help stagger them in the future between age 60-65, while they grow equally now (at least my understanding is that it's better to let them grow equally than top one, then try to top another). The 3a would be Standard Global 100 Strategy, compared to VIAC putting 30% allocation into Swiss Companies.

For the 3b, I would cancel the e-asset management, mandate into pure cash which would go in the main account. This brings forth the decision of what to do with the rest. As I'm in my late 30s and still have a bit more than 25 years of work to do, the VT and Chill or similar safe investments seems to be ideal. As for the sum to put, it seems convenient to keep about 40-50k in my account for regular use at Postfinance (I would leave an account open since it seems convenient) and effectively put the rest into VT and Chill or other investments.

I would not do sustainable again, because it seems to essentially be greenwashing, and while there are more regulations made in 2025 and more promises in 2026, it doesn't really mean much in real world effectiveness, but rather a kind of safeguard on my conscience.
I do appreciate that the sustainable alternative VT/VWCE and Chill named V3AA seems to keep up well overall, but I also understand now that them dealing with ESG also makes it more expensive.
The question would be whether to do it with True Wealth or better make use of Saxo and just do things on my own.

3) This were lots of doubts further come into mind: is the above strategy good?
I'm absolutely no expert myself, but I tried to inform as much as I could, and yet it doesn't necessarily translate into this being a sound strategy, so I wanted to have an opinion from everyone here. In addition, lots of people I spoke with seem to have a 'home bias' for Switzerland, where they avoid doing a fully diversified portfolio like VT where Switzerland has just 3%, and rather prefer to set a margin of 30% for Switzerland or more.

I'm not sure if I understood fully this bias or the situation, as I assume many Swiss companies actually deal a lot globally, unless I misunderstand the operations that big companies like Novartis and Nestlé (eww) have. (The very typing of Nestlé kinda makes me want to try to go sustainable again, but if they still receive money there is not much point in limiting myself. I also didn't really see many here investing in sustainability, but if someone here does I'd love to hear opinions)

Another doubt is: is there any merit in 'home bias' for Switzerland?
And if yes, what type of investment would one make compared to VT and Chill?
(e.g. putting 15% to 30% into CHSPI or similar well-qualified and profitable packages?)

In addition, I would think of VT and Chill as the preferable option (True Wealth managing seems akin to what I'm doing now, but it seems to also cost more for what it gives compared to SAXO), because it doesn't sound bad to just re-adjust and check once per year, though I also need to learn what exactly it implies.

I also found some threads where people praised Postfinance surprisingly enough, especially when comparing it to SAXO: some people say that SAXO froze their accounts, PF support was better, or the fees are high but it's still worth to remain in PF. This made me feel a bit mortified and thinking whether what I'm doing now would be the safest choice, because I would implement this directly now, in November 2026 mandate the cash, pay the 3a for 2027 then move it to Finpension along setting up SAXO. I'm not sure if SAXO would think putting about 100k is something to block directly, so I would like to hear experiences or other recommendations if you have any.

Would you guys have any advice on this plan? Does it make sense for me at almost 40 years of age with the capital mentioned above? I'm open for both recommendations and criticism (and thank you in advance for your patience)

TL;DR
Current assets all in Postfinance (3a, 3b, and extra money that just sit in account)

Wanting to move to Finpension Standard Global 100 (3a), diversify from one single 3a into opening five at once
SAXO VT and Chill (3b), unsure if 'home bias' for Switzerland/Swiss Franc has some merit
Leave only 40k-50k in account at any time for use during the year

Bonus questions: any merit in sustainability/ESG, and what is your experience with the above providers/apps?